[peirce-l] Re: 1st image of triangle of boxes (MS799.2)

[Gary Richmond]

Jim, Ben, List, Jim Piat wrote: Yes, but Peirce also wrote (chapter 20 Trichotomic of The Essential Peirce Vol 1 page 281  line two of paragraph two)  that  "A sign is a third mediating between the mind addressed and the object represented". So I find this confusing. There are so many complexities in all this, Jim, that I am sure this must be an on-going discussion. But please forgive my earlier 'fresh' comment as these are issues which surely need to be addressed. As for the TRICHOTOMIC document (which I am very familiar with since it was one of the core documents--along with A Guess at the Riddle) which got me thinking about developing Peirce's applied science of trichotomic as trikonic, that is, in diagrammatic form. Now you can imagine that the very passage you refer to had me bug-eyed on first reading. I think, however, that one has to consider the various ways the term 'sign' is used in Peirce as he struggles as a 'backwoodsman' with his new science of semeiotic and its terminology. In the following excerpt, for example, which introduces a very famous passage defining the sign relationship, Peirce makes a point of distinguishing representamina from signs. Now there's been for sure a great deal of controversy about what this particular passage means. Peirce writes: CP 1.540 .. . .  I must begin the examination of representation by defining representation a little more accurately. 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. As suggested, I can't say that his ensuing comments actually clarify this issue. But in any event they lead to the famous passage: CP 1.541 My definition of a representamen is as follows:     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. Now here it seem clear enough to at least some scholars (for example, Kelly Parker in his monograph on continuity in Peirce) that he is talking about a genuine triadic relationship in the categorial sense in which the representamen is a first (suspending for a moment the possible other ways in which 'sign' might be employed as in the TRICHOTOMIC passage you referred to--btw, do you or anyone else know of any other place where he refers to 'sign' as a third?)  I know only of this one, which I think may illuminate the passage being considered in so far as Peirce notes that "in genuine Thirdness, the first, the second, and the third are all three of the nature of thirds." CP 1.537 Now in genuine Thirdness, the first, the second, and the third are all three of the nature of thirds, or thought, while in respect to one another they are first, second, and third. The first is thought in its capacity as mere possibility; that is, mere mind capable of thinking, or a mere vague idea. The second is thought playing the role of a Secondness, or event. That is, it is of the general nature of experience or information. The third is thought in its role as governing Secondness. It brings the information into the mind, or determines the idea and gives it body. It is informing thought, or cognition. But take away the psychological or accidental human element, and in this genuine Thirdness we see the operation of a sign. CP 1.538  Every sign stands for an object independent of itself; but it can only be a sign of that object in so far as that object is itself of the nature of a sign or thought. For the sign does not affect the object but is affected by it; so that the object must be able to convey thought, that is, must be of the nature of thought or of a sign. Every thought is a sign.  But I won't say more about this passage just yet as I was just reminded of it and need to reflect more on it. But is is at least suggestive to me as to a way to possibly proceed. But continuing, why, you ask, should a sign be a first? Peirce suggests that the answer is because a representamen within this genuine triadic semeiotic relationship has a 'character' (early on, the ground)--now, character, quality, etc. are firstnesses: CP 1.564 . . . A very broad and important class of triadic characters [consists of] representations. A representation is that character of a thing by virtue of which, for the production of a certain mental effect, it may stand in place of another thing. The thing having this character I term a representamen, the mental effect, or thought, its interpretant, the thing for which it stands, its object. One sees that this trichotomic relationship will flow into and finally characterize even the very branches of logic as semeiotic so that Peirce writes: CP 2.229 . In consequence of every representamen being thus connected with three things, the ground, the object, and the interpretant, the science of semiotic has three branches. The first is . . .  pure grammar. It has for its task to ascertain what must be true of the representamen used by every scientific intelligence [i.e., one capable of learning from experience GR]  in order that they may embody any meaning. The second is logic proper [critical logic or critic GR]. It is the science of what is quasi-necessarily true of the representamina of any scientific intelligence in order that they may hold good of any object, that is, may be true. Or say, logic proper is the formal science of the conditions of the truth of representations. The third. . .  I call pure rhetoric [or methodeutic GR]. Its task is to ascertain the laws by which in every scientific intelligence one sign gives birth to another, and especially one thought brings forth another. But perhaps Peirce's language is too loose (and backwoodsmanish varying) and so potentially and actually confusing especially a century after he wrote and for we who can't ask him "what did you mean by calling a sign a third in the TRICHOTOMIC passage when in most every other case you refer to a sign as a first?"  (Again I would be very interested in being alerted to any other exceptions to Peirce's referring to a sign/representamen as a First). Here's a familiar passage which suggests again that Peirce's use of 'sign' and 'representamen' has various usages which can certainly be confusing. CP 5.119 . Therefore, if you ask me what part Qualities can play in the economy of the universe, I shall reply that the universe is a vast representamen, a great symbol of God's purpose, working out its conclusions in living realities. Now every symbol must have, organically attached to it, its Indices of Reactions and its Icons of Qualities; and such part as these reactions and these qualities play in an argument that, they of course, play in the universe -- that Universe being precisely an argument The "vast representamen, a great symbol "? Here representamen is equated with 'symbol' and symbols are associated with thirdness? So, again,  perhaps you're right to be questioning some of this, Jim What matters most I believe is the spirit in which one inquires. Certainly one needs to learn to doubt, but not "paper doubts" as Peirce once put it, and there is enough of categorial integrity throughout Peirce's work that even if the exception doesn't prove the rule, there seems to me to be no need to throw out the categorial baby with the bath water of some of the terminological confusion we've been examining. Those, however, who doubt the deep categorial structure of what I--and many others--see in most every aspect of Peirce's philosophy (e.g., in presenting his Classification of the Sciences he remarks that almost (!) all are trichotomies) should make their position very clear here as authentic doubt does indeed further our common inquiry. Best, Gary --- Message from peirce-l forum to subscriber archive@mail-archive.com