Dear Doctor Rose,
Thank you for your reply!
--
The quote from John Deely had an important original context because it
potentiallyreferred to metaphysical concerns with “positive internal characters
of the subject”.
---------------
Now, in my incredibly small experience with Peirce, I have noticed there are
times when he pays strict logical attention and times when he is more
‘colloquial’. Sometimes the ‘colloquial’ is not just ‘ordinary discourse itself
– which I have argued elsewhere in relation to Umberto Eco ALWAYS triumphs over
philosophical discourse [which is always a mere interruption to ‘ordinary
discourse’ that always goes on to render philosophy insignificant] – but rather
refers to old style ‘metaphysics’ as he does here.
------------
Deely has several special [to himself] issues that would put the Peirce quote
into a completely different light possibly. One such issue is the theological
‘soul’. Another relates to his very good book on and continuing high regard for
Martin Heidegger. I would think neither Peirce nor Heidegger would accept
literally the metaphysical connotation of “positive internal characters of the
subject”. Heidegger, in whom Deely most properly and almost uniquely recognizes
the semiotic aspect of Heidegger [something I was lucky enough to see in
Heidegger’s 1916 doctoral thesis on the categories of John Duns Scotus whom
Peirce admired].
----------------
Heidegger would unreservedly reject any literal reference to “internal” and to
“subject” in his “Dasein” or Being-there since it is a field of experience
presented to the human being which, as far as it is ‘known’ is completely
‘external’ and open to be delimited by language. It would seem to me Peirce
would do the same since it seems to me that for him experience is an
undelimited whole or totality. But I could very well be wrong on this for
Peirce.
----------------
Heidegger does recognize obscurely an unknown aspect of Dasein. But since such
a ‘thing’ is not experienced directly and is not related to language as either
‘ordinary’ nor ‘philosophical’ discourse, it can only be approached obliquely
or asymptotically. The Heideggerian scholar William J. Richardson SJ does this
with Lacanian psychoanalysis which, it seems anyway, Deely disapproves of. The
point is, it seems with both Heidegger and Peirce, the popular phrase “What you
see is what you get” is taken in a strict and radical sense. I think also both
consider the ‘unconscious’ as a matter of historicity being logically being
teased out of the long dream of language which completely overwhelms any one
individual.
-----------------
Another issue with Deely and Heidegger related to this is Deely’s seemingly
strict separation between human consciousness, which dreams the dream of
language, and the ‘animal’ which largely does not do so. Heidegger also
separates the two but simply as an observation and method of trying to delimit
language within manageable bounds, and not because of a religious agenda since
he explicitly holds for an “atheistic methodology”. In other words, if he had
found another animal than human being he could converse with, he would have no
ideological or theological problem, being more attuned to Nietzsche in this
matter.
----
Therefore I raise another question: “Does Peirce raise a distinct separation
between the human being as the only linguistic animal, and if so, where, and if
not, where?”
-----------------
Gary C. Moore
----- Forwarded Message -----
From: Stephen C. Rose <[email protected]>
To: Gary Moore <[email protected]>
Cc: [email protected]
Sent: Wednesday, April 25, 2012 6:36 AM
Subject: Re: [peirce-l] Fw: [peirce-l] PEIRCE QUOTATION FROM JOHN DEELY LOCATION
The wonders of Google,
Commens Peirce Dictionary: Thirdness, Third [as a category]: "
Thirdness, Third [as a category]
(see also Firstness, Secondness, Categories)
"Careful analysis shows that to the three grades of valency of indecomposable
concepts correspond three classes of characters or predicates. Firstly come
"firstnesses," or positive internal characters of the subject in itself;
secondly come "secondnesses," or brute actions of one subject or substance on
another, regardless of law or of any third subject; thirdly comes
"thirdnesses," or the mental or quasi-mental influence of one subject on
another relatively to a third." ('Pragmatism', CP 5.469, 1907)"
'via Blog this'
I didn't realize that Steven was quoting this in his most interesting post.
Cheers. S
ShortFormContent at Blogger
On Wed, Apr 25, 2012 at 3:17 AM, Gary Moore <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>
>----- Forwarded Message -----
>From: Gary Moore <[email protected]>
>To: Steven Ericsson-Zenith <[email protected]>
>Sent: Wednesday, April 25, 2012 2:14 AM
>Subject: Re: [peirce-l] PEIRCE QUOTATION FROM JOHN DEELY LOCATION
>
>
>Thank you! I was expecting more. But it just seems to be passing phraseology.
>GCM
>
>
>From: Steven Ericsson-Zenith <[email protected]>
>To: Gary Moore <[email protected]>
>Sent: Wednesday, April 25, 2012 2:09 AM
>
>Subject: Re: [peirce-l] PEIRCE QUOTATION FROM JOHN DEELY LOCATION
>
>
>It's there, second sentence of the second paragraph.
>
>
>Steven
>
>--
> Dr. Steven Ericsson-Zenith
> Institute for Advanced Science & Engineering
> http://iase.info
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>On Apr 24, 2012, at 11:30 PM, Gary Moore wrote:
>
>> Dear Doctor Ericsson-Zenith,
>> Thank you for the reply! However, unless my brain is far too fuzy, I do not
>> find John Deely's quotation "the positive internal characters of the subject
>> in itself". Did Doctor Deely misquote? Did the quote come from elsewhere?
>> -----
>> It is an intriguing statement possibly subtantualizing both "internal" and
>> "subject" which, in Deely and Poinsot's terminology would mean they are
>> foundational terminals in a Peircean Triad would it not?
>> -----
>> Does anyone have suggestions, referrences, or information?
>>
>> Thank you for your consideration,
>> Gary C. Moore
>>
>> P. S. If I have done anything improper please tell me. I am new to the group.
>> From: Steven Ericsson-Zenith <[email protected]>
>> To: Gary Moore <[email protected]>
>> Sent: Wednesday, April 25, 2012 1:12 AM
>> Subject: Re: [peirce-l] PEIRCE QUOTATION FROM JOHN DEELY LOCATION
>>
>> FYI
>>
>> CP 5.469 This illustration has much more pertinence to pragmatism than
>> appears at first sight; since my researches into the logic of relatives have
>> shown beyond all sane doubt that in one respect combinations of concepts
>> exhibit a remarkable analogy with chemical combinations; every concept
>> having a strict valency. (This must be taken to mean that of several forms
>> of expression that are logically equivalent, that one or ones whose
>> analytical accuracy is least open to question, owing to the introduction of
>> the relation of joint identity, follows the law of valency.) Thus, the
>> predicate "is blue" is univalent, the predicate "kills" is bivalent (for the
>> direct and indirect objects are, grammar aside, as much subjects as is the
>> subject nominative); the predicate "gives" is trivalent, since A gives B to
>> C, etc. Just as the valency of chemistry is an atomic character, so
>> indecomposable concepts may be bivalent or trivalent. Indeed, definitions
>> being
scrupulously observed, it will be seen to be a truism to assert that no
compound of univalent and bivalent concepts alone can be trivalent, although a
compound of any concept with a trivalent concept can have at pleasure, a
valency higher or lower by one than that of the former concept. Less obvious,
yet demonstrable, is the fact that no indecomposable concept has a higher
valency. Among my papers are actual analyses of a number greater than I care to
state. They are mostly more complex than would be supposed. Thus, the relation
between the four bonds of an unsymmetrical carbon atom consists of twenty-four
triadic relations.
>>
>> Careful analysis shows that to the three grades of valency of indecomposable
>> concepts correspond three classes of characters or predicates. Firstly come
>> "firstnesses," or positive internal characters of the subject in itself;
>> secondly come "secondnesses," or brute actions of one subject or substance
>> on another, regardless of law or of any third subject; thirdly comes
>> "thirdnesses," or the mental or quasi-mental influence of one subject on
>> another relatively to a third. Since the demonstration of this proposition
>> is too stiff for the infantile logic of our time (which is rapidly
>> awakening, however), I have preferred to state it problematically, as a
>> surmise to be verified by observation. The little that I have contributed to
>> pragmatism (or, for that matter, to any other department of philosophy), has
>> been entirely the fruit of this outgrowth from formal logic, and is worth
>> much more than the small sum total of the rest of my work, as time will show.
>>
>> Steven
>>
>> --
>> Dr. Steven Ericsson-Zenith
>> Institute for Advanced Science & Engineering
>> http://iase.info
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Apr 24, 2012, at 10:40 PM, Gary Moore wrote:
>>
>> > To whom it may concern,
>> > In John Deely's FOUR AGES OF UNDERSTANDING page 647 he quotes Peirce as
>> > saying "the positive internal characters of the subject in itself"
>> > [footnote 109 Peirce c. 1906: CP 5.469].
>> > -------------
>> > I only have the two volumes of THE ESSENTIAL PEIRCE and cannot locate it.
>> >
>> > Gary C Moore
>> > P O Box 5081
>> > Midland, Texas 79704
>> > [email protected]
>> > ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> > You are receiving this message because you are subscribed to the PEIRCE-L
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>> > [email protected] with the line "SIGNOFF PEIRCE-L" in the body
>> > of the message. To post a message to the list, send it to
>> > [email protected]
>>
>>
>>
>
>
>
>
>
>
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