Edwina, List, You say: "In Plato and others, I understand that knowledge is a priori and the existential world is a weak and possibly corrupt version of this ‘wholeness’. Indeed, this assumption is a basic format of most monotheistic religions!"
Not being a Plato scholar, I find the dialogues great fun to read--especially in the company of others--such as students. At times, it can be challenging to sort out the views of the various interlocutors. My general approach is to interpret the texts as exercises--written by Plato--for the students at the Academy. Considered in this light, then one can think of the works as an opportunity to rehearse various lines of inquiry in the company of others who were at the Academy, such as Eudoxus, Thaeatetus and Aristotle. I think of Plato as a philosopher who is engaging in active inquiry. Instead of treating his "Platonism" as a collection of conclusions he has adopted, I interpret most of the arguments as lines of inquiry being explored. It is clear he thinks some lines are more promising than others. Having said that, the various interlocuters (Socrates included) often find themselves retracing their steps--trying to figure out where they might have gone wrong. I read Peirce in a similar way. He is often considering a range of hypotheses, and he is exploring various ways competing hypotheses might be put to the test. Through this process, theories of logic, metaphysics, etc. do take shape, but Peirce considers many of the conclusions drawn as provisional in character. One could, as he does in some places, stop and assign varying degrees of confidence to the propositions that make up a given theory. If one took the time to do that, I think we would find many of the propositions attributed to Peirce are held with degrees of confidence that range from low to moderate. He holds such views because he doesn't yet see better answers to the questions at hand. There are numerous shortcomings in the explanations offered, but he is hoping such views might lead to better hypotheses at some point in the future. So, if you want to take up some of Plato's lines of inquiry, let me know. Doing so would require that we look at the texts and try to sort out the arguments--bit by bit. An attempt to summarize Plato's views in a sentence or two will, I tend to think, miss the living and growing character of the methods and processes of inquiry he is modeling in the dialogues. Yours, Jeff ________________________________ From: [email protected] <[email protected]> on behalf of Edwina Taborsky <[email protected]> Sent: Thursday, November 7, 2024 3:20 PM To: Peirce-L <[email protected]> Cc: edwina Taborsky <[email protected]> Subject: [PEIRCE-L] Plato and Peirce Jeff, list I repeat some of my points from a previous post - which is a focus on what I see as a fundamental difference between Plato and Peirce - which is - the direction, so to speak, of knowledge. In Plato and others, I understand that knowledge is a priori and the existential world is a weak and possibly corrupt version of this ‘wholeness’. Indeed, this assumption is a basic format of most monotheistic religions! Whereas, the sense I get from Peirce is a rejection of this concept - with its an essential split between Mind and Matter - and an outline that almost rejects full knowledge and instead, sets up an infrastructure where knowledge, which includes the actual existential forms that matter can be, actually evolves and increases and yes - even changes! This is a huge difference. The a priori Platonic universals [Forms] posits knowledge as a priori timeless nature. This sets up a mindset focused around the concept of ‘purity’ and ’the ideal’. But the Peircean outline, to me, rejects this. My understanding of Peircean universals is that they, as habits of Formation, are generated within and by existential matter as it evolves and interacts with other existents. [objective-idealism]. His whole outline of the emergence the universe [ 1.412] and 6.214—is as an evolutionary cosmology [6.102] “where all the regularities of nature and of mind are regarded as products of. Growth and to a Schelling-fashiooned idealism which holds matter to be mere specialized and partially deadened mind” 6.102…. And “ideas tend to spread continuously and to affect certain others which stand to them in a peculiar relation of affectibility. In this spreading they lose intensity and especially the power of affecting others, but gain generality and become welded with other ideas’. 6.104. In this reference, it seems to me that generals actually evolve within the universe. And since the three categories are basic modes within the universe - then, the universe has its own capacity to self-organize and generate these universals - as outlined in 1.412, where habits emerge and develop. And ’the unsettled is the primal state”. 6.348 - which would be, I suggest, the opposite of Platonism. That is - Peirce sets up a semiosic infrastructure, which, in my view, enables such an evolutionary and almost unknowable universe. 1] He defines the three categorical modes of being as basic to the universe. These modes include teh capacity to change without intention [Firstness]; the reality of existential individuality [ Secondness] and the reality of commonality among these individualities [ Thirdness]. 2] And Peirce’s outline of the Complete Sign as an irreducible triad as the basic method of such adaptive evolution sets up a method for the informational transformation of data from one Sign to another Sign, and, with the categories, the transformation of their input data into generals. ]See outline in 6.142]…”the affection of one idea by another”… “It is that the affected idea is attached as a logical predicate to the affecting idea as a subject”. And “No sign can function as such except as far as it is interpreted in another sign’ {8.225f]….the essence of the relation is in the conditional futurity”. 3] I note again Peirce’s insistence that this semiotic triad is an active, transformative function - 1908 MS[R]277 By a Sign is meant any Ens which is determined by a single Object or set of Objects called its Originals, all other than the Sign itself, and in its turn is capable of determining in a MInd something called its Interpretant, and that in such a way that the Mind is thereby mediately determined to some mode of conformity to the Original or Set of Originals. This is particularly intended to define [very imperfectly as yet] a Complete Sign”. [my emphasis]. And “signs …are triadic” 6.344.. 3] The concept of the Dicisign -, ]See outline in 6.142]…”the affection of one idea by another”… “It is that the affected idea is attached as a logical predicate to the affecting idea as a subject”. .. That is - Dicisgns, are not merely descriptive [ mental] of an object but are indexically connected to that object. I stress this fact - that the dicisign is materially, physically, connected…and is basic to the Peircean infrastructure. If you add to this format, the categories, you produce a system where existential information and knowledge can be both generated, increased - and lost. {See Robert Marty’s The Lattice of Five Paths]/ As Peirce outlines in his description of a semosic interaction 8.314]…”The Dynamic Object is the identity of the actual or Real meteorological conditions at the moment” - ie - the DO is not an external object but THIS external object with which I am interacting in THIS semiosic function. This thus moves the information of the DO into a semiosic transformation. As such, by continuous induction, “a habit becomes established [ 6.145]. ….”Thus, by induction, a number of sensations followed by one reason become united under one general idea followed by he same reaction”…6.146. This sets up a habit or general…ie..one that is generated within existential matter by the ‘Mind’ that is operative within matter as Thirdness. ————— My point is - that this system is the complete opposite of the Platonic system - and - I’d say that the Platonic system with its concept of the ‘ideal ‘ [whether a priori or in the future] is grounded in much of the thought processes of the world [ certainly in monotheism!] - and the Peircean system is… very different. Edwina
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