[Inquiry] Re: Logic Of The Sciences -- Discussion

[Jon Awbrey]

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LOTS.  Discussion Note 12

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KM = Kirsti Määttänen

Re: LOTS-DIS 9.  http://stderr.org/pipermail/inquiry/2005-March/002431.html
In: LOTS-DIS.    http://stderr.org/pipermail/inquiry/2005-March/thread.html#2416

Kirsti,

Let me preface with a general remark.  The comments in question arose out
of a discussion with Bernard Morand that had to do with vague attitudinal
differences between logical and mathematical ways of approaching various
subjects, then later with differences between pure and applied emphases.
I am not really trying to generate all possible isms in any systematic
way here, as I usually regard these as "looking for trouble", that is,
ultimately leading to misconceptions of their subject matter whenever
they are pursued exclusively.  So I tried to put all the hedges that
I could think of around the very idea of hardening these very vague
and tentative differences into any kind of classification scheme.
With all that in mind, let me see if I can address your remarks.

KM: Thanks for your response.  However, I could not quite
    figure out what exactly was your answer to the question
    I posed.  So, I'm asking for some further clarifications. 

KM: You took up "OS-planar or SI-planar" and "SI-ism and OS-ism". 
    You never mention ground.  Why is that?

I cited many passages where Peirce discussed the concept of a ground,
but it still seems like too variable a notion to make an ism out of it,
not that I'd want to.  Taken at the tide, to comprehend the ground is to
understand the very rationale of the relation in its totality, so this does
not lend itself to an ism, which always has to do with a partial perspective.
Another reason why I call the ground "shifty" is that its adicity or dimension
varies with the level of genericity or degeneracy in the relations in question.

JA: I concocted those terms as a sign relational way of approximating
    objectivism versus coherentism, and several other related dualisms. 

KM: OK, that accords with what I thought you had in mind.
    Still, do you find it so that amongst the dualisms in
    the various -isms, there are as good as none based on
    reference to a ground?  That is what I would expect,
    in analogy with what I have found in respect to
    various dualisms in other fields of inquiry. 

KM: Anyway, I could not figure out what part
    of your mail was intended as your answer
    to my WHY- question.  You then wrote: 

JA: The notion of a ground is one of the most protean concepts in the
    entire Peircean corpus, figuring heavily in his earliest approaches
    to sign relations but fading almost wholly into the background of his
    last, best definitions of sign relations. 

KM: How do you mean?  Do you mean that if the concept
    of ground (or the term!) fades to the background
    in Peirce's last definitions of sign relation,
    then it is OK to leave it more or less out of
    consideration?  That would surprise me, on
    the basis of your contributions I've read.

I am presently trying to follow the developments that
took place in Peirce's thinking between 1865, when he
approaches the question of how science works with the
tools of Aristotelian syllogism and Linnaean taxonomy,
and 1870, when he articulates a notational system for
the logic of relative terms that is in its power and
promise still ahead of our times.

By way of landmarks on this journey, we may note a transition
from using the coordinates <ground, object, subject> to using
the coordinates <sign, object, interpretant>.  For my part, I
am still in the process of understanding the reasons for this
pattern of development.  At present, it appears that the more
intensional or rule-oriented concept of a ground mutates into
the more extensional or case-oriented idea that relations are
collections of tuples.  This takes us beyond 1870, but we can
see early stages of it in the 1870 LOR, where the teridentity
relation, presciently enough, plays a role in the conversion.

KM: On the other hand, you then wrote: 

JA: In some sense the most general concept of ground
    is always implicit in every consideration of not
    just sign relations, but relations in general.

KM: This accords in the main with how I have learned to understand
    "ground".  However, the synonyms you provided I do not view as
    synonyms, exactly, but rather less vague (more specific?) notions,
    determined by the context in question, to a certain degree.  So, I
    cannot see this primarily as a question of providing definitions for
    each.  Rather, I see this as something calling for Peirce's logic of
    vagueness.  In my understanding, the concept of ground and the logic
    of vagueness go hand in hand, so to say.  Well, I'm afraid I have not
    expressed myself very well here, but I hope you'll get the main idea.

I will have to think about that ...

Jon Awbrey

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