[Inquiry] Re: Sign Relations -- Discussion

[Jon Awbrey]

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SR.  Discussion Note 1

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BM = Bernard Morand
JA = Jon Awbrey

Re: SR-COM 3.  http://stderr.org/pipermail/inquiry/2005-January/002244.html
In: SR-COM.    http://stderr.org/pipermail/inquiry/2005-January/thread.html#2242

BM: This is the good point Jon!  I split your commentary into its two components:

JA: At this point it may be useful to remark that most of the
    complexity of the above unpacking is due to the fact that
    we put the burden of maintaining the entire sign relation
    on the backs of the individual signs, as if it were their
    job to carry the load all by themselves.  Perhaps this is
    true in actual point of fact, ...

BM: Yes, this is the problem with samples (individual signs): they can only 
    stand for the generality of the sign relation to some extend.  However, it 
    is often interesting to inquire whether we manage to retrieve the general 
    features through the sample.  And it is clear that we need the knowledge of 
    such general structure to do this job, one kind of inductive method I think.

We have in fact two kinds of sampling:  the elementary sign relation <o, s, i>,
a particular moment in which something (s) means something (o) to somebody (i),
is a sample from the sign relation, L c O x S x I, that we have in mind at the
moment, and the sign relation L is just one example under the definition of a
sign relation.  Indeed, we may consider the set L itself to be a sample from
a larger sign relation L' c O' x S' x I', of a similar type or otherwise.

At this point, though, at least so far as the most general concept
of a sign relation, I am content to think that Peirce has already
done sufficient work of induction to find a fruitful definition,
and the work of necessary reasoning could potentially proceed
from that alone, though, as a practical matter it is nearly
indispensable to prop up one's resoning with the assistance
of concrete examples, so long as one recognizes the extra
properties that they are bound have as concrete examples.
Moreover, in doing so, one advances the work of what we
may call "species reasoning", or the classification of
natural subtypes.  And then, there's always the chance
that we'll hit upon a more fruitful concept by keeping
in touch with the empirical phenomena that continue to
turn up on their own, as if unbidden by our deductions.

JA: ... but for the sake of logical analysis it is much more convenient
    and achieves much the same effect to think of the sign relation
    separately as a structure that is preserved invariant under
    the allowable processes of sign relational transformation,
    or semiosis.

BM: Quite agreed on the principle.  I am not sure as regards to "the same effect".
    In fact thinking through the structure invariance will not be enough for
    understanding the transformation at work within individual signs semiosis;
    nevertheless I agree that this structure has to be preserved there.

Yes, we can water the hedges around "same effect" as needed over time.
And you are also right about the second point.  As I have occasionally
pointed out, the process "semiosis" exists at a more specific level than
the structure "sign relation", because it requires the specification of
a temporal sequence as an additional parameter, one that is not required
by the bare definition of a sign relation.  There is something analogous
to a type-token relationship here, in which the time-free types of signs
are cast at a level more abstract than their time-bound tokens in a given
example of semiosis, that is in general just one of many that are possible
to generate from out of the same abstract sign relation.

Jon Awbrey

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