[peirce-l] Re: Representamens and Signs (was "Design and Semiotics Revisited"was "Peircean elements")

[Gary Richmond]

Theresa, Frances & List, Certainly Peirce at moments & in places suggests that there may be representamen which are not signs, probably the clearest & simplest example being that famous sunflower. CP 2.274. . .A Sign is a Representamen with a mental Interpretant. Possibly there may be Representamens that are not Signs. Thus, if a sunflower, in turning towards the sun, becomes by that very act fully capable, without further condition, of reproducing a sunflower which turns in precisely corresponding ways toward the sun, and of doing so with the same reproductive power, the sunflower would become a Representamen of the sun. But thought is the chief, if not the only, mode of representation. and this is implied in the passage you just quoted: CP 1.540 . . . all signs convey notions to human minds; but I know no reason why every representamen should do so. When, however, he's considering the universe as "perfused with signs, if it is not composed exclusively of signs," Peirce has considerably broadened his notion of what a sign may be (never forgetting also that a person may be a sign from that perspective) to include, apparently, all representamens whatsoever. See: CP 5.448 Fn P1 Para 5/6. . . the fact that the entire universe -- not merely the universe of existents, but all that wider universe, embracing the universe of existents as a part, the universe which we are all accustomed to refer to as "the truth" -- that all this universe is perfused with signs, if it is not composed exclusively of signs. The distinction that I saw Frances making--or at least I hope this is the case-- is the difference between signs which "convey notions to human minds" and those representamen which Peirce sees "no reason" to imagine need necessarily do so. It is this distinction which I thought I saw Frances employing in her post concerning Ben's ideas about collateral knowledge which prompted the current discussion. Now this may all be just my interpretation of this matter, and no doubt I should let Frances speak for herself in the matter. Yet it seems to me that whatever the terminology used, it may prove useful to distinguish between signs conveying "notions to human minds" and those representamens which need not do so (again, consider the sunflower). Gary Theresa Calvet wrote: Frances, and list: Frances, you say: "In my guess, it may be that for Peirce in the evolution of things "representamens" are more say monadic or dyadic and primitive then "signs" where objects that act as "signs" require them to be say triadic and the "thought" of organisms, while "representamens" may not. My current access to the published writings of Peirce is however limited, which further irritates me." I really have no idea what made you guess that. Definitely not Peirce and what he wrote. For Peirce the word "representamen" is a more technical term than the word "sign". Please read the following from Lecture III (Lowell Lectures of 1903): "In the first place, as to my terminology, I confine the word REPRESENTATION to the operation of a sign or its RELATION TO the object FOR the interpreter of the representation. The concrete subject that represents I call a SIGN or a REPRESENTAMEN. I use these two words, SIGN and REPRESENTAMEN, differently. By a SIGN I mean anything which conveys any definite notion of an object in any way, as such conveyers of thought are familiarly known to us. Now I start with this familiar idea and make the best analysis I can of what is essential to a sign, and I define a REPRESENTAMEN as being whatever that analysis applies to. If therefore I have committed an error in my analysis, part of what I say about SIGNS will be false. For in that case a SIGN may not be a REPRESENTAMEN. The analysis is certainly true of the representamen, since that is all that the word means. Even if my analysis is correct, something may happen to be true of all SIGNS, that is of everything that, antecedently to any analysis, we should be willing to regard as conveying a notion of anything, while there might be something which my analysis describes of which the same thing is not true. In particular, all signs convey notions to HUMAN MINDS; but I know no reason why every representamen should do so" (CP 1.540; the words in capital letters here are in italics in the original published text). And then Peirce adds his definition of a representamen (this whole definition is in italics including all the words in capital letters): "A REPRESENTAMEN is a subject of a triadic relation TO a second, called its OBJECT, FOR a third, called its INTERPRETANT, this triadic relation being such that the REPRESENTAMEN determines its interpretant to stand in the same triadic relation to the same object for some interpretant" (CP 1.541). CP 1.542: "It follows at once that this relation cannot consist in any actual event that ever can have occurred; for in that case there would be another actual event connecting the interpretant to an interpretant of its own of which the same would be true; and thus there would be an endless series of events which could have actually occurred, which is absurd. For the same reason the interpretant cannot be a DEFINITE individual object. The relation must therefore consist in a POWER of the representamen to determine SOME interpretant to being a representamen of the same object" (words in capital letters here are in italics in the original published text). Theresa Calvet --- Message from peirce-l forum to subscriber [EMAIL PROTECTED] --- Message from peirce-l forum to subscriber archive@mail-archive.com