[Inquiry] Actual, Existent, Real

[Jon Awbrey]

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AER.  Note 1

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I think that Peirce went along with the medieval definition,
where "real" means "having properties".  As I undertstand it,
actuality is sufficient but not necessary to reality.

Cf: Inquiry Driven Systems, 1.3.4.14  Application of OF:  Generic Level
http://members.door.net/arisbe/menu/library/aboutcsp/awbrey/inquiry.htm

With some corrections here:

IDS 59.  http://stderr.org/pipermail/inquiry/2004-May/001498.html
IDS 60.  http://stderr.org/pipermail/inquiry/2004-May/001499.html

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IDS.  Note 59

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1.3.4.14.  Application of OF:  Generic Level (cont.)

With respect to the objective genre of properties and instances,
I can now give the following characterization of icons and indices:

   Icons are signs by virtue of being instances of properties of objects.
   Indices are signs by virtue of being properties of instances of objects.

Because the initial discussion seems to flow more smoothly if I apply
2-adic relations on the left, I formulate these depictions as follows:

   For Icons:     Sign(Obj)  =  Inst(Prop(Obj))
   For Indices:   Sign(Obj)  =  Prop(Inst(Obj))

Imagine starting from the sign and retracing steps to reach the object,
in this way finding the converses of these relations to be as follows:

   For Icons:     Obj(Sign)  =  Inst(Prop(Sign))
   For Indices:   Obj(Sign)  =  Prop(Inst(Sign))

In spite of the apparent duality that is manifested between these patterns
of composition, there is nevertheless a significant asymmetry to be observed
in the way that the insistent theme of realism interrupts the underlying genre.
In order to understand this, it is necessary to note that the strain of pragmatic
thinking I am using here takes its definition of "reality" from the term's original
Scholastic sources, where the adjective "real" means "having properties".  Taken in
this sense, reality is necessary but not sufficient to "actuality", where "actual"
means "existing in act and not merely potentially" (Webster's).  To reiterate,
actuality is sufficient but not necessary to reality.  The difference between
the ideas of actuality and reality is further pointed up by the fact that
a potential can be real and that its reality can be independent of any
particular moment in which the power acts.

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IDS.  Note 60

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1.3.4.14.  Application of OF:  Generic Level (cont.)

The "angelic doctrines" about the nature of reality
that I alluded to above would probably remain distant
from the present concern, were it not for the following
points of connection.

Pragmatic reality means possessing properties under interpretation.
Relative to the genre of properties and instances, the distinction
of reality, that can be granted to certain objects of thought and
not to others, serves a function analogous to the distinction that
sets apart "sets" from "classes" in modern versions of set theory.
Regarding the membership relation "element of" as the predecessor
relation in a predetermined hierarchy of classes, a class attains
the status of a set, and by dint of this becomes an object of more
determinate discussion, simply if it has successors.  Standing over
and against this parallelism, pragmatic reality is distinguished from
both the medieval and the modern versions by the fact that its reality
is always a reality to somebody, and thus bears information about its
reality in the proportion of the interpretive community to whom its
presence is borne.  This is due to the circumstance that it takes
both an abstract property and a concrete interpreter to evidence
the practical reality of an object.

This project seeks articulations and implementations of intelligent activity
within dynamically realistic systems.  The individual stresses that were just
now placed on articulation, implementation, actuality, dynamics, and reality
serve to reinforce the importance of three further issues:

Acting and Being.  Systems theory, consistently pursued, requires for
its rationalization a distinct ontology, one in which states of being
and modes of action form the principal objects of thought, and out of
which the ordinary species of stably extended but derivative objects
have to be constructed.  In the "grammar" of this process philosophy,
verbs and pronouns are more basic than nouns.  In its impact on the
direction of this discussion, this emphasis on systematic action is
tantamount to the constitution of an objective genre that regards
dynamic systems, their momentary states and their passing actions,
as the ultimate objects of synthesis and analysis.  Consequently,
the course of this work will be turned toward conceiving actions,
as traced out in the trajectories of systems, to be the primitive
elements of construction, in this objective genre more fundamental
than the customary arrays of stationary objects extended in space.
As a corollary, one comes to anticipate that physical objects of
the static variety will be relegated to a derivative status in
relation to the activities that orient agents, both organisms
and organizations, towards the ends of purposeful objectives.

Dynamic and Symbolic.  Taking clues from etymology, the notion of "dynamics"
has to do with "power", but in the original sense of the word that connotes
"potential".  The brand of pragmatic thought that I use in this work allows
potential entities to be treated as real objects and it regards the objects
of concepts to be constituted by the conception of their actual effects in
practical instances.  In the move to unify dynamic and symbolic approaches
to intelligent systems, there remains a need to build conceptual bridges
between these two realms.  A intellectual facility for relating objects
to their actualizing instances and their instantiating actions lends
many useful tools to an effort of this nature, in which the search
for understanding cannot rest until each object and phenomenon is
reconstructed in terms of active occurrences and ways of being.

Finding and Making.  In prospect of form, it does not matter whether
one conceives this project as a task of analyzing and articulating
the actualizations of a capacity for inquiry that already exist
in nature, or whether one views it as a task of synthesizing
and artificing the potentials for inquiry that have yet to
be conceived in practice.  From a formal perspective, the
analysis and the synthesis are just reciprocal ways of
tracing and retracing the same generic patterns of
potential structure that determine actual form.

Jon Awbrey

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inquiry e-lab: http://stderr.org/pipermail/inquiry/
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