[PEIRCE-L] Re: Time and ITR (Irreducible Triadic Relation)
Hi Ed, *(1) On what real grounds does it make sense to claim that there may be three types of times? * Time is a sign, and all signs are relations among three entities -- sign itself (or representamen), the object the sign is referring to and the effect the sign has on the mind of the interpreter of the sign, called the interpretant, which can be represented diagrammatically thus: f g Object --- Representamen --- Interpretant | ^ | | |_| h Figure 1. A diagrammatic representation of the Peircean sign. f = sign production; g = sign interpretation; h = information flow. grounding, or correspondence. Since there is no doubt that time is a sign, it must possess three irreducible aspects which I identified as real time, physical time, and formal time. Furthermore, I suggest that real time can be identified with processes occurring in nature, and physical time is identical with measured time, and formal time is a theoretical model of the real time. *(2) As you speak of the real and the physical: Is physical time not real for you? Why not?* To me, physical time is measured or lived time, whereas real time is something present even before measurement and acting as the source of physical time. *(3) If you just admit that somebody, for example Isaac Newton, may already have solved the enigma of time: Would it not make sense to explore this solution, instead of continuing to consider alternative hypotheses? Why not ask your students if they have ever read Newton, and what they would think of the reversibility or irreversibility of a second law that reads a change in motion is proportional to the motive force impressed? * I am interested in exploring the concept of time based on the principle of irreducible triadic relation (ITR) that Peirce formulated that seems to apply universally, far more universally than any physical laws, including Newtonian laws of motion (NLM). For example, ITR applies to linguistics and self-organizing chemical reactions, but NLM does not. *(4) The simple fact that you again and again quote Newton's second law of motion (while actually referring to Euler's law) as a time-reversible example demonstrates the importance of this example for your argument. Of course, if there should be an irreversible law of motion at the very basis of science, your considerations would prove at least superfluous.* Remember that my argument is based on ITR, not NLM. Even if NLM is time-irreversible as you claim, that would not affect my argument, as long as there are other laws of physics that are time-reverse invariant. *(5) Please will you finally see that it is not my version of the second law which I ask you to respect but Newton's. If you would read him, you would learn that there is no dualism of absolute and formal time but of absolute time and relative times: the absolute and infinite time serving as the invariant standard of measurement of the finite times of physical experience, which relative times then are evidently the real physical times which you're missing in Newton's law as you're insisting to misread it. What sense does it make to impute to Newton a concept of time-reversibility that (as everybody knows) proves totally absurd and nonsensical with respect to reality? Do you not think that this means to make dubious the reputation of a colleague, and should therefore be considered very carefully before doing so?* It may be that NLM requires only two types of time, whereas ITR predicts three types of time. Perhaps NLM times are a reduced version of the ITR times, just as the Saussurean DYADIC sign can be viewed as a reduced version of the Peircean TRIADIC sign ? *(6) Perhaps your object of study is not reality but Peircean metaphysics. In this case, we would be speaking about different things. My object of study is reality, the reality of time, which is physical and real insofar as it is measurable, and which, in order to be measurable, requires absolute invariant standards for determining the measurable things relative to that standards, as it happens in every real process of measurement (not only of times). So there are in reality two (not three) types of time: (1) the absolute standard, and (2) the times measured relative to that standard. You have both types before your eyes should you use a traditional analogue watch with a face and hands to show you the actual time. There is the scaled round of 24 hours on the face, representing the standard of measurement, or the absolute time; and there are the real physical times that you are measuring relative to that standard, as they are given through the position of the watch's hands relative to the said standard of measurement. That's it. And that's
[PEIRCE-L] Re: Time and ITR (Irreducible Triadic Relation)
Hi Ed, What I am claiming is that there may be three types of times -- 'real', 'physical', and 'formal' that are mutually connected through ITR (irreducible triadic relation). As an example of 'formal time', also called 'reversible time', I cited the time appearing in Newton's second law of motion, F = md^2s/dt^2, which is invariant with respect to time reversal, i.e., F does not change when t is replaced by -t. You objected that I used the wrongly interpreted version of the Newton's second law, and, if I used your version of the law, my argument would not hold, since then F would not be time-reversal invariant. I accept that, but this would not affect my argument, since I am sure there are other physical laws, if not Newton's second law, that would exhibit the time-reversal invariance, thus supporting the concept of 'formal time' in contrast to 'physical time' which is always irreversible. Your version of Newton's second law may contain absolute and formal times, but not physical time, while Peircean triadic metaphysics (as I understand it) would predict absolute (or 'real' as I call it), physical, and formal times. All the best. Sung On Tue, Jul 28, 2015 at 4:42 PM, Ed Dellian ed.dell...@t-online.de wrote: Dear Sung, my impression is that you're conflating Newton's irreversible geometric law of motion impressed force is proportional to change in motion with Leonhard Euler's reversible formula, the analytical arithmetic-algebraic force equals mass-acceleration law (for the first discovery of this law in Berlin on Sept. 3, 1750 see L. Euler, Découverte d'un nouveau principe de Mécanique, Mem. Acad. Roy. Sci. Berlin, vol. 6 , 1750 (1752), pp. 185-217). In order to avoid such a conflation, please note (1) that to be proportional is not the same as to be equal, (2) that a finite change in motion is not the same as a continuous acceleration. Wouldn't you admit, then, that an irreversible second law of Newton should make some difference for your line of resoning? As I said it before: It makes no sense to proceed with your studies on the presupposition of misinterpretations. And, a misinterpretation remains a misinterpretation, no matter for how many years or centuries how many scientists, including big shots and Nobel prize winners, have believed in it. Let me, by the way, declare here that I do not interprete Newton, nor do I propose my personal theory of motion, rather I do what many other scientists most regrettably have refused and still are refusing to do, namely, *read Newton's laws and take the author at his words* (maybe because they do not read Latin). Moreover, it is not my point here to say that Newton's authentic laws *are true* with respect to nature, rather I ask you to admit: Whether or not these laws are true *can only be decided on the basis of what Newton has actually written. *Finally, I think that Newton, as a colleague, simply deserves that you quote him correctly. Best wishes, Ed. Am 28.07.2015 um 21:49 schrieb Sungchul Ji: Hi, I am wondering if time is irreducibly triadic in the following three senses: (*1*) As a Peircean sign, i.e., time as a name or a representamen referring to a process and interpreted by a mind as such: fg Process --- Time as a name --- Time as theorized (object) (representamen) (interpretant) | ^ | | || h Figure 1. Time as an irreducible triadic sign. As always, the arrows can be read as determines or constrains in a broadest sense. f = encoding; g = decoding; h = grounding, correspondence or information flow (*2*) As a mechanism or a process: f g Past --- Present --- Future | ^ | | |__| h Figure 2. Time as an irreducible triadic process. f = natural law-governed; g = natural law- and human intention-governed; h = information flow (*3*) Figure 1 seems to reflect the formal aspect of time (or 'formal time'), while Figure 2 reflects the material/physical aspect of time (or 'physical time'). These two types of times together may constitute the 'real time', suggesting the following triadic diagram: f g Real Time --- Physical Time --- Formal Time | ^ | | || h Figure 3. The postulate that there are three irreducible aspects to time. f = natural process; g = mental process; h = information flow, or
