[Inquiry] Re: Sign Relations -- Discussion

[Jon Awbrey]

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SR.  Discussion Note 19

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Charles, Eugene, Jim, Peirce List,

CSP: | But we have direct experience of things in themselves.
     | Nothing can be more completely false than that we can
     | experience only our own ideas.

The way I read this, Peirce is making a point that
is a familiar one from the stance of phenomenology.
It is just that we have experience of things that
are independent of us.  Our experience constitutes
a phenomenological fact.  But that is not to say
that we infallibly experience things in themselves
'as' they are in themselves -- there is still that
shade of a difference there.  We know this from the
the comparison of conflicting experiences, not all
of which can be reconciled.  Peirce makes this point
in order to avoid the trap of solipsistic idealism,
but it does not say that experience is identical
to the thing in itself.

Also, I don't think Peirce identifies experience and knowledge.
Yes, we sometimes use "knowledge" to mean "acquaintance", but
I think that Peirce uses it more in the sense of "episteme",
or "underatanding".  We have many experiences that we do
not understand.

Jon Awbrey

Charles Pyle wrote:
> 
> Yes, perhaps I parsed those statements by Peirce incorrectly.
> 
> What about this quote:
> 
> "But we have direct experience of things in themselves."
> 
> I paraphrase: We have direct experience of things.
> = Experience that is not mediated by signs.
> 
> Here is the whole paragraph to provide context.
> 
> 95. The first thing to be taken into consideration is the general upshot of
> Kant's Critic of the Pure Reason. The first step of Kant's thought -- the
> first moment of it, if you like that phraseology -- is to recognize that all
> our knowledge is, and forever must be, relative to human experience and to
> the nature of the human mind. That conception being well digested, the
> second moment of the reasoning becomes evident, namely, that as soon as it
> has been shown concerning any conception that it is essentially involved in
> the very forms of logic or other forms of knowing, from that moment there
> can no longer be any rational hesitation about fully accepting that
> conception as valid for the universe of our possible experience. To repeat
> an example I have given before, you look at an object and say "That is red."
> I ask you how you prove that. You tell me you see it. Yes, you see
> something; but you do not see that it is red; because that it is red is a
> proposition; and you do not see a proposition. What you see is an image and
> has no resemblance to a proposition, and there is no logic in saying that
> your proposition is proved by the image. For a proposition can only be
> logically based on a premiss and a premiss is a proposition. To this you
> very properly reply, with Kant's aid, that my objections allege what is
> perfectly true, but that instead of showing that you have no right to say
> the thing is red they conclusively prove that you are logically justified in
> doing so. At this point, the idealist appears before the tribunal of your
> reason with the suggestion that since these metaphysical conceptions, that
> repose upon their being involved in the forms of logic, are only valid for
> experience and since all our knowledge is relative to the human mind, they
> are not valid for things as they objectively are; and since the conception
> of existence is preeminently a conception of that description, it is a mere
> fairy tale to say that outward objects exist, the only objects of possible
> experience being our own ideas. Hereupon comes the third moment of Kant's
> thought, which was only made prominent in the second edition, not, as Kant
> truly says, that it was not already in the book, but that it was an idea in
> which Kant's mind was so completely immersed that he failed to see the
> necessity of making an explicit statement of it, until Fichte misinterpreted
> him. It is really a most luminous and central element of Kant's thought. I
> may say that it is the very sun round which all the rest revolves. This
> third moment consists in the flat denial that the metaphysical conceptions
> do not apply to things in themselves. Kant never said that. What he said is
> that these conceptions do not apply beyond the limits of possible
> experience. But we have direct experience of things in themselves.†1 Nothing
> can be more completely false than that we can experience only our own ideas.
> That is indeed without exaggeration the very epitome of all falsity. Our
> knowledge of things in themselves is entirely relative, it is true; but all
> experience and all knowledge is knowledge of that which is, independently of
> being represented. Even lies invariably contain this much truth, that they
> represent themselves to be referring to something whose mode of being is
> independent of its being represented.†2 This is true even if the proposition
> relates to an object of representation as such. At the same time, no
> proposition can relate, or even thoroughly pretend to relate, to any object
> otherwise than as that object is represented. These things are utterly
> unintelligible as long as your thoughts are mere dreams. But as soon as you
> take into account that Secondness that jabs you perpetually in the ribs, you
> become awake to their truth. Duns Scotus and Kant are the great assertors of
> this doctrine, for which Thomas Reid deserves some credit too. But Kant
> failed to work out all the consequences of this third moment of thought and
> considerable retractions are called for, accordingly, from some of the
> positions of his Transcendental Dialectic. Nor in other respects must it be
> supposed that I assent to everything either in Scotus or in Kant. We all
> commit our blunders.
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Jim Piat [mailto:piat325 at charter.net]
> Sent: Saturday, October 01, 2005 3:04 PM
> To: Peirce Discussion Forum
> Subject: [peirce-l] Re: Sign Relations
> 
> Dear Charles, Jon, Folks--
> >
> > Peirce, which appear on the face of it to assert the validity of direct,
> > unmediated knowledge, from an email of April 17, 2001 to this forum sent
> > by
> > Jean-Marc Orliaguet [jmo at medialab.chalmers.se] as a turn in an extensive
> > debate. (I extract the essential point following the quote):
> >
> > Peirce: "our knowledge of things in themselves is entirely relative, it is
> > true; but all experience and all knowledge is knowledge of that which is,
> > independently of being represented" 6.95
> >
> > knowledge of that which is, independently of being represented
> >
> > I paraphrase: knowledge independent of representation
> 
> Dear Charles, Jon, Folks--
> 
> I favor what I understand to be Jon's interpretation of this issue.
> What I think Peirce is intending to convey in the quote above is
> the following:
> 
> 1.  We can only know things in themselves be means of medaition or
> representation.  In this sense knowledge depends upon or is relative to
> mediation.
> 
> 2.  However, notwithstanding the above, what we know of various things in
> themselves is not distorted by the mediation.  What we know of things in
> themselves (albeit mediated by representation) is truly the things in
> themselves as they actually exist in reality and not, for example,  some
> figment of our imaginations.
> 
> If one can not hear without a hearing aide, one is dependent upon a hearing
> aid to hear; but this does not mean that what one hears (the sound itself)
> is other than what it is.    If one requires a dollar to ride a bus this
> does not necessarily mean the bus ride in itself is other than what it would
> be if it a dollar fee were not required.  Of course, the meaning consequence
> and perhaps the very essence of riding a bus might depend upon whether or
> not one has to pay a dollar or not  -- but this is not a logical
> requirement.   Being able to ride the bus depends upon paying the fee but
> the nature of the bus ride in iself is independent of the fee.  Accesss to
> knowledge of things in themself depends upon mediation but the knowledge of
> the thing in itself thus accessed is in not otherwise dependent upon (or
> distorted by) mediation.
> 
> I paraphrase:  The only knowledge we have of things is mediated by
> representation, but this knowledge is of those things in themselves
> as they truly are.
> 
> Not to be confused with drawing false conclusions based upon applying faulty
> reasoning to to our mediated but true knowledge of things in themselves as
> they actually are.
> 
> Course I could be misunderstanding Jon, Peirce or you Charles --
> and I comment mostly to gain a better understanding myself.
> 
> Not sure this helps to advance the discussion but it might help
> to point out where I've misunderstood.
> 
> Cheers,
> Jim Piat

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