[peirce-l] Re: A sign as First or third...

[Gary Richmond]

Jim,  List, I've been enjoying the challenging discussion as well as it has certainly served to sharpen my and I assume other's thinking in the matter. I too would honor all the participants in the discussion by saying that their comments were invaluable in contributing to thinking this matter through as far as its gone But, you quoted me: GR: So, finally,  is a sign a First or a Third? It seems to me at this point in my reflection that it functions as both, transmuting itself as the sign grows in the continuation of a semiotic process. And began your message:   . . . what you say in the above post seems corrrect to me in so far as my present understanding of this complex issue goes.  Now,  if we allow that even an object (if taken as part of triad of objects) can serve as a first or third I think we have come full circle and in some sense also merged with the position put forth by Jean-Marc.   Could it be that Peirce's classifications of signs accommodates (my word for the day) both points of view? No, I reject Jean-Marc's analysis for the most part for the reasons I offer below. Jean-Marc wrote: Gary Richmond wrote: ...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. this is almost a Lapalissade, what is Peirce saying here? nothing more than that in a triadic relation, there are three things, a first thing, a second thing and a third thing.  (I'm using non-capitalized words for ordinals and the capitalized words 'First', 'Second', 'Third' to denote classes of relations or categories) I was glad to learn a new French word, lapalissade (used above in the sense of a truism, though it could mean something different, namely a self-evident truth--for example, after newly grasping the meaning and significance of a geometrical diagram--which is how I will take it). I'm beginning to see that the fragment from CP 1.537 may hold the key--or part of it--to resolving the present controversy. I'd like to try to explicate and analyze the quotation employing one of the 10 classes of signs, namely the 10th and last, the argument (argument symbolic legisign) diagrammed trikonically: Just a brief preliminary comment before I set down the tirkonic diagram of the sign class "argument" (sign 10) I am reading the trikonic diagram in the involutional order Peirce uses to name the 10 signs in his triangular diagram at CP 2.264 (which, by the way, is not the only order that could be considered, but which I employed in my diagram of the Classification of Signs mainly to show the involutional order of P's naming, also as a mnemonic device, but also to suggest the  importance of involutional analysis in semeiotic in theoretical grammar--e.g, at a different and certainly higher level than the one of the present, I pointed to how Joe Ransdell  recently commented on the involutional order of the argument which involves the proposition which involves the rheme, etc.] Argument(ative) symbolic legisign: [again start to the right at the position of thirdness] legisign 3/2/1 |>argument symbol First, Peirce says that "the first, the second, and the third are all three of the nature of thirds," that is they will each be part of the representation of the ground of a (usually complex) object  in some mind or quasi-mind when they are functioning in semiosis (i.e., mediating the meaning of the sign). So the sign as a whole is a third in a genuinely triadic sense in which each of its parts is necessary but not sufficient for a genuine triadic relation--thus as these three relate to the sign itself (legisign), the object (symbol) and the interpretant (argument But Peirce continues: while in respect to one another they are first, second, and third. 1ns, legisign (the sign as sign is categorially first) 3/2/1 |> 3ns, argument (in relation to the interpretant, the sign is a complex sign employing perhaps all other sign types in its unfolding) 2ns, symbol (the object--that is, the immediate object in the mind--is itself categorially second) Now there may be nothing simple about this, and it is certainly no truism. Rather I think it points to the interpenetration of 1ns/2ns/3ns in complex structures and for semiosis. Jean-Marc continued: JO:  Take any of these 3 things and they will mediate between the one (first) and the other (second). this is true of all 3 members of the relation, that is to say that all members are genuine Thirds in that they mediate between a first member and another member of the relation. There is a truth in this is so far as in any genuine triadic relationship each of the three not only in a sense (but not a categorial one) may mediate between the other two, but that indeed it is in the nature of genuine triadic relationships that they necessarily do. Jean-Marc continues: JO:  which one *is* the first, which one *is* the second, which one *is* the third? the question makes no sense. Give me the relation, then I'll tell you which members, within the relation, is the first, the second and the third relate.. Done above in the example offered (see my trikonic slideshow and paper at Arisbe for many more illustrations).  JO:  Now when a first thing among the three is considered in itself (i.e as a First *within the relation*), the second thing can then be considered as "other than" the first (i.e. as a Second  in opposition to the first thing *still within the relation*), and the third thing is considered as mediating between the first and the second, (i.e in its role as a Third). There you have both the categories and the ordinals. order has no importance. [emphasis added] It is not correct to conclude as Jean-Marc does that " order has no importance." Let's take the order Jean-Marc employs, what I've called the Hegelian order, but which is also Peirce's order of something/other/medium. Can one start with medium? Of course not! So even dialectic demands and precisely is this order 1st, thesis, 2nd antithesis, 3rd synthesis.Can one start with antithesis or synthesis? Of course not! Take any member of the relation, it will mediate between the other two. This has just been disproved, again in his sense that "order has no importance" at this level of analysis. So again, and in my opinion, Peirce is not expressing a "truism" here,  but rather, like so much else that can result from prepared, clear-headed and open-minded diagram observation (at least since Euclid ) it may be seen to be a "self-evident truth." 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. Gary --- Message from peirce-l forum to subscriber archive@mail-archive.com