Re: [PEIRCE-L] Mark Token Type

[John F Sowa]

Jon, List,

I'm sorry, but I  don't understand why you're jumping through all kinds of 
hoops to defend a rather poor choice of terminology that Peirce happened to 
mention just once.  (Except for once more in the LNB.)

First, the terms potisign, actisign, and famisign are the kinds of words that 
Peirce frequently coined.  The three pages of EP2 show a great deal of thought, 
which is much more than he wrote about that trichotomy in 1906.   It's also 
very closely reasoned thought, which is consistent with many issues he had been 
discussing for years.  Except for the fact that those words are rather ugly, 
they are the result of deep thinking.

By contrast, the word 'tone' in 1906 sounds like a quick choice based on one 
rather rare kind of sign (a tone of voice).  The word 'mark' is much more 
natural, more general, more consistent with his definition in Baldwin's 
dictionary, and much, much easier to explain to intelligent listeners and 
readers who are not Peirce scholars.  (And I believe that those people are the 
most important audience for Peirce scholars to address.)

Furthermore, Tony Jappy has been devoting years to his analysis of the 
evolution of Peirce's writings in his last decade.  I have also been devoting a 
great deal of study to the evolution of other aspects, especially EGs during 
that decade.  And I find Tony's analyses convincing and compatible with my own 
studies and with other studies of Peirce's last decade.

There is nothing further to discuss about this topic.  You said that you had 
read Tony's writings.  i strongly urge you to study them.

John


From: "Jon Alan Schmidt" 

John, List:

JFS: Peirce defined this trichotomy [potisign/actisign/famisign] without making 
any reference to (Tone Token Type).

This is highly misleading--Peirce wrote EP 2:478-490 over three consecutive 
days (1908 Dec 23-25), and he did make reference to tone/token/type both before 
and after introducing potisign/actisign/famisign.

CSP: For a "possible" Sign I have no better designation than a Tone, though I 
am considering replacing this by "Mark." Can you suggest a really good name? An 
Actual sign I call a Token; a Necessitant Sign a Type. (EP 2:480, 1908 Dec 23)

CSP: Consequently, Signs, in respect to their Modes of possible Presentation, 
are divisible into:
A. Potisigns, or Objects which are Signs so far as they are merely possible, 
but felt to be positively possible ...
B. Actisigns, or Objects which are Signs as Experienced hic et nunc; such as 
any single word in a single place in a single sentence of a single paragraph of 
a single page of a single copy of a Book. ...
C. Famisigns, familiar signs, which must be General, as General signs must be 
familiar or composed of Familiar signs. (EP 2:483, 1908 Dec 24)

CSP: But I dare say some of my former names are better than those I now use. I 
formerly called a Potisign a Tinge or Tone, an Actisign a Token, a Famisign a 
Type ... I think Potisign Actisign Famisign might be called Mark Token Type (?) 
(EP 2:488, 1908 Dec 25)

Peirce was dissatisfied with potisign/sinsign/actisign and was considering 
replacing "tone" with "mark," so he explicitly asked Lady Welby for her 
opinion, which she gave a few weeks later--"I should prefer tone to mark for 
the homely reason that we often have occasion to say 'I do not object to his 
words, but to his tone'" (SS 91, 1909 Jan 21). He tentatively replaced 
"potisign" with "mark," using the word "might" and a parenthetical question 
mark, but then wrote "tone" in his Logic Notebook two days later 
(https://iiif.lib.harvard.edu/manifests/view/drs:15255301$636i, 1908 Dec 
27)--his last known mention of this trichotomy.

Again, some might hold the opinion that "mark" is a better choice than "tone" 
for the first member of the trichotomy for sign classification whose other two 
members are "token" and "type," but no one can accurately claim that "mark" was 
Peirce's final and definitive choice.

CSP: In particular, the relations I assumed between the different classes were 
the wildest guesses and cannot be altogether right I think. (EP 2:489, 1908 Dec 
25)

JFS: In short, Peirce himself called some of his earlier discussions of 
trichotomies "the wildest guesses".

What Peirce here calls "the wildest guesses" are not the trichotomies 
themselves but "the relations I assumed between the different classes." In 
other words, he never presents all ten trichotomies of the 1906-1908 taxonomies 
in their proper logical order of determination for working out the 66 sign 
classes. Instead, he repeatedly presents them in phaneroscopic order.

JFS: For the definition of Mark, by itself, his definition in Baldwin's 
dictionary should be considered and compared to what he wrote about Potisign.

I agree, and sure enough, there is nothing in Peirce's definition of "mark" for 
Baldwin's Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology about it being a sign whose 
mode of being, apprehension, 

Re: [PEIRCE-L] Mark Token Type

[Jon Alan Schmidt]

John, List:

JFS: Peirce defined this trichotomy [potisign/actisign/famisign] without
making any reference to (Tone Token Type).


This is highly misleading--Peirce wrote EP 2:478-490 over three consecutive
days (1908 Dec 23-25), and he *did* make reference to tone/token/type both
before and after introducing potisign/actisign/famisign.

CSP: For a "possible" Sign I have no better designation than a *Tone*,
though I am considering replacing this by "Mark." Can you suggest a really
good name? An Actual sign I call a *Token*; a Necessitant Sign a *Type*.
(EP 2:480, 1908 Dec 23)

CSP: Consequently, Signs, in respect to their Modes of possible
Presentation, are divisible into:
A. *Potisigns*, or Objects which are Signs so far as they are merely
possible, but felt to be positively possible ...
B. *Actisigns*, or Objects which are Signs as Experienced *hic et nunc*;
such as any single word in a single place in a single sentence of a single
paragraph of a single page of a single copy of a Book. ...
C. *Famisigns*, familiar signs, which must be General, as General signs
must be familiar or composed of Familiar signs. (EP 2:483, 1908 Dec 24)

CSP: But I dare say some of my former names are better than those I now
use. I formerly called a *Potisign* a *Tinge* or *Tone*, an *Actisign* a
*Token*, a *Famisign* a *Type* ... I think *Potisign Actisign Famisign*
might be called *Mark Token Type (?)* (EP 2:488, 1908 Dec 25)


Peirce was dissatisfied with potisign/sinsign/actisign and was *considering*
replacing "tone" with "mark," so he explicitly asked Lady Welby for her
opinion, which she gave a few weeks later--"I should prefer *tone* to
*mark* for
the homely reason that we often have occasion to say 'I do not object to
his words, but to his *tone*'" (SS 91, 1909 Jan 21). He *tentatively*
replaced "potisign" with "mark," using the word "might" and a parenthetical
question mark, but then wrote "tone" in his Logic Notebook two days later (
https://iiif.lib.harvard.edu/manifests/view/drs:15255301$636i, 1908 Dec
27)--his last known mention of this trichotomy.

Again, some might hold the opinion that "mark" is a *better *choice than
"tone" for the first member of the trichotomy for sign classification whose
other two members are "token" and "type," but no one can accurately claim
that "mark" was *Peirce's *final and definitive choice.

CSP: In particular, the relations I assumed between the different classes
were the wildest guesses and cannot be altogether right I think. (EP 2:489,
1908 Dec 25)

JFS: In short, Peirce himself called some of his earlier discussions of
trichotomies "the wildest guesses".


What Peirce here calls "the wildest guesses" are not the trichotomies
themselves but "the *relations* I assumed between the different *classes*."
In other words, he never presents all ten trichotomies of the 1906-1908
taxonomies in their proper *logical* order of determination for working out
the 66 sign classes. Instead, he repeatedly presents them in *phaneroscopic*
order.

JFS: For the definition of Mark, by itself, his definition in Baldwin's
dictionary should be considered and compared to what he wrote about
Potisign.


I agree, and sure enough, there is nothing in Peirce's definition of "mark"
for Baldwin's *Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology* about it being a
sign whose mode of being, apprehension, or presentation is "merely
possible" as distinguished from an existent token and a necessitant type.
On the contrary ...

CSP: *Mark*. To say that a term or thing has a mark is to say that of
whatever it can be predicated something else (the mark) can be predicated;
and to say that two terms or things have the same mark is simply to say
that one term (the mark) can be predicated of whatever either of these
terms or things can be predicated.
The word translates the Latin *nota*. It has many practical synonyms such
as quality, mode, attribute, predicate, character, property, determination,
consequent, sign. Most of these words are sometimes used in special senses;
and even when they are used in a general sense, they may suggest somewhat
different points of view from mark. (
https://gnusystems.ca/BaldwinPeirce.htm#Mark)


By this definition, a mark is a term that can be predicated of things of
which other terms are predicated. For example, "scarlet" and "crimson" are
different terms that both have the term "red" as a mark--anything that is
scarlet or crimson is also red. However, the *term* "red" is obviously not
a tone/potisign, it is always a token/actisign of a type/famisign. On the
other hand, the *color* red--as well as a specific shade like scarlet or
crimson--can be a tone/potisign when and where it serves as "an indefinite
significant character."

Regards,

Jon Alan Schmidt - Olathe, Kansas, USA
Structural Engineer, Synechist Philosopher, Lutheran Christian
www.LinkedIn.com/in/JonAlanSchmidt / twitter.com/JonAlanSchmidt

On Sun, Apr 7, 2024 at 9:11 PM John F Sowa  wrote:

> Jon, List,
>
> We acknowledge that 

Re: [PEIRCE-L] Zoom lecture on the CSP's role in philosophy of science (U Pitt)

[John F Sowa]

Jeff,

There seem to be quite a few people who are interested in discussing 
applications of Peirce's logic and philosophy to current issues.  That was 
certainly a hot topic in the various Peirce -ennials.

I believe that it would be a topic of general interest.

John


From: "Jeffrey Brian Downard" 
Sent: 4/8/24 12:35 AM
To: "Michael J.J. Tiffany" , 
"s...@bestweb.net" 
Cc: Peirce List 
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Zoom lecture on the CSP's role in philosophy of science 
(U Pitt)

Hello Michael and John,

Nice to hear from you on the List, Michael.
I agree with your suggestions in (1) and (2). How might we further draw out 
some of Peirce’s suggestions for explaining the evolution of cooperation in a 
wide variety of systems, ranging from ecosystems to human economic and 
political systems? Complex emergent phenomena, such as the flow of information 
across the world wide web, provide us with fruitful case studies for modeling 
and explaining the growth of order in systems having parts that stand in 
relations of reciprocity and interdependence.
I think Peirce’s central model for explaining the growth of order in physical, 
chemical, biological, and human social systems is the cycle of logical inquiry. 
Let me know if you are interested in exploring these ideas further on the list 
or as part of a small research and discussion group.
Yours,
Jeff Downard
Flagstaff, AZ
Philosophy, NAU
From: peirce-l-requ...@list.iupui.edu  on 
behalf of Michael J.J. Tiffany 
Date: Sunday, April 7, 2024 at 10:57 AM
To: s...@bestweb.net 
Cc: Peirce List 
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Zoom lecture on the CSP's role in philosophy of science 
(U Pitt)



John, List:

I agree with John regarding the urgent relevance of Peirce to this century.

I have been a subscriber to this list for 17 years (since I was 26). In that 
time, among other things, I co-founded a billion dollar cybersecurity company 
(HUMAN Security, also one of the TIME100 Most Influential Companies 2023). Two 
personal observations:

1. Agapism has greater predictive power than the "Gospel of Greed" Peirce 
railed against in "Evolutionary Love", his fifth article for the Open Court. In 
evolutionary biology, I think this is substantially clearer now than in 
Peirce's time, with the careful study of countless cases of group selection > 
individual selection.

However, Peirce's insight is still underappreciated in today's thinking about 
socio-economic evolution. Wealth creation -- distinct from zero sum wealth 
transfer -- comes from a kind of sustainable generosity. There are many 
examples of successful wealth aggregators whose success could be predicted with 
naive selection pressure heuristics like "survival of the fittest" or even 
"greed is good." However, those heuristics cannot account for the extraordinary 
wealth creation of the past 200 years nor the motivations of the most 
successful creators and the massive amount of cooperation they shepherded. 
Peirce's model isn't just nicer or more inspiring. It's a literally more useful 
model for understanding and predicting reality, especially complex emergent 
phenomena (the "worlds hidden in plain sight" as the Santa Fe Institute once 
put it).

2. An understanding of Peirce's notion of abduction dramatically accelerates 
understanding of the (surprising!) emergent functionality of large pretrained 
transformer models like GPT-4. (BTW it is a CRAZY tragedy that there's another, 
vastly less useful, meaning of "abduction" now, hence having to write 
qualifiers like "Peirce's notion of...".) In fact, I don't see how you can 
understand how this emergent behavior arises -- what we're calling the 
reasoning capabilities of these models -- without an understanding of abduction 
as a kind of activity that you could be better or worse at.

Warm regards,

Michael J.J. Tiffany

Portsmouth, New Hampshire

On Sun, Apr 7, 2024 at 11:58 AM John F Sowa  wrote:

Following is an offline note endorsing my note that endorses  Jerry's note 
about the upcoming talk on Friday, which emphasizes the importance of Peirce's 
writings for our time (the 21st C).

Basic point:  Peirce was writing for the future.  Those of us who value his 
contributions should emphasize his contributions to his future, which is our 
present.

John



Sent: 4/7/24 10:36 AM
To: John Sowa 
Subject: FW: [PEIRCE-L] Zoom lecture on the CSP's role in philosophy of science 
(U Pitt)

John,
I harbor a suspicion, perhaps more like a fantasy, that had Peirce’s 
‘pragmaticism’ carried the day against James & Dewey, logical and empirical 
positivism and the ‘linguistic turn’ wouldn’t have established the beachhead in 
philosophy of science that has pretty clearly, imho, led to the global 
existential crisis we’re facing today at the event horizon of mass extinction. 
Similarly, perhaps if Karl Popper had succeeded more widely in his opposition 
to the 

[PEIRCE-L] Fwd: [teadus.biosemiotics:9384] Unresolved problems in biosemiotics

[Gary Richmond]

FYI: GR

Dear friends and colleagues,



We invite you to join the panel on biosemiotics which will take place at
the world congress of semiotics „Signs and Realities“ in Warsaw, Poland, 2–6
September this year.   The biosemiotics panel
– “Unresolved problems in biosemiotics” – was proposed by Don Favareau and
me (description below).

Deadline for abstracts is 15 April. Please submit
 your abstract.



With all best wishes

Kalevi & Don



Fundamentals of semiotics are not yet concisely formulated, theory of
meaning making requires still much work in clarification. Biosemiotics has
the major responsibility in this work inasmuch biosemiotics concerns the
general semiotics.

Among the unresolved problems we can recognize, for instance, the following:

(a) the minimal conditions for a metabolic system to carry semiosis;

(b) the relationship between interpretation, free choice, subjective
present, umwelt, agency, logical paradox, and semiosis;

(c) the operational typology of prelinguistic signs;

(d) the nature of (sign) modality as such;

(e) existence (and description) of forms of semiosis that never appear in
human communication or in human bodies;

etc.

We should also pay attention to the perspective methods to be used for
providing the solutions. In particular, this concerns the role of
mathematical and empirical study methods. This includes several problems,
for instance:

(x) whether the fundamental semiotic theory can be formulated in
mathematical terms;

(y) which are the general methods to be used for testing semiotic models.

The panel will include a roundtable to discuss the unresolved problems in
biosemiotics. We ask all interested scholars to participate in this
roundtable and to propose the ideas for solutions.
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
ARISBE: THE PEIRCE GATEWAY is now at 
https://cspeirce.com  and, just as well, at 
https://www.cspeirce.com .  It'll take a while to repair / update all the links!
► PEIRCE-L subscribers: Click on "Reply List" or "Reply All" to REPLY ON 
PEIRCE-L to this message. PEIRCE-L posts should go to peirce-L@list.iupui.edu . 
► To UNSUBSCRIBE, send a message NOT to PEIRCE-L but to l...@list.iupui.edu 
with UNSUBSCRIBE PEIRCE-L in the SUBJECT LINE of the message and nothing in the 
body.  More at https://list.iupui.edu/sympa/help/user-signoff.html .
► PEIRCE-L is owned by THE PEIRCE GROUP;  moderated by Gary Richmond;  and 
co-managed by him and Ben Udell.