I just happened to notice your recent comments, and I was wondering if this is relevant to your discussion...

Human exceptionalism, our ordinary cortex and our research futures
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/dev.21838?fbclid=IwAR16m9iNFl9-2PYuJMrxSx4cmU2n6hLEfPalT796hPQYK3TdU6tkX0tsrbE

Your thread also reminded me of a scholarly article I recently read pointing to the fact that modern man killed off and absorbed their closest relatives (e.g. Neanderthal). When considering that, perhaps it makes us a little less 'outlier'?

Well, apparently my post in the Lounge was removed. I will try posting the written version in a new thread.

I feel that there are many writers on the site who prefer to shut down thinking rather than open up the most creative possibilities. — Jack Cummins

Hello Jack :)

Thank you for your very well written response. You mentioned being too vague. I think what the challenge is here is in trying to converse more generally in a forum very saturated with nominalists who only want to converse in particulars. It's one of the reasons I have been so enamored with Peirce's categories of inductive, abductive, and deductive reasoning. People can easily talk past one another if it's not clear that they are examining a subject with the same tools of logic, and in a logical sequence. Hence, Peirce's scientific method.

It's a pleasure to meet you. I hope we can have many great discussions. :)

Hello Gnomon,

I see you haven't posted on this forum in months either.

I'm not sure you will see this. I hope you are doing well.

Anyway, since you mentioned postmodernism and Foucault, I thought I would share with you this message I received. I just finished Episode 5: A Bird's Eye View, and Episode 6 will be titled 'The Inside Out of Color', but I do plan on fulfilling the request of this new friend when I get to writing Episode 7. This thread of yours is full of wonderful dialogue which will be quite helpful for my writing prompts!

Well, I tried to post the message image here, but it didn't work. Perhaps a link will.....
IMAGE

Hello Gnomon,

I think the post I just did in the lounge might clarify some of the points in this thread.

I hope you and yours have stayed safe and well in these turbulent times.

Perhaps my post in the Lounge might help clarify some of these discussion points.

I hope you and others here have stayed safe and well with all of the recent turmoil in the world.

ABSOLUTELY! Please see my last post in the Lounge.

I corrected the above link. Cheers! :wink:

My BothAnd philosophy is also a pragmatic (non-ideal) solution to the current clash of values in the world, as exemplified by religious terrorists and angry atheists. It requires self-doubt and compromise in place of absolute Faith and Jihad/Crusade against infidels. The destructive Negation problem is due to Either/Or absolutism on both sides. — Gnomon

Gnomon, this friend of mine on YouTube (Marcos) just came out with another great video. We have highlighted each other's channels on our own, as there are so many levels of learning capabilities in others out there. My work is geared to starting at very basic levels of thinking and walking forward. Marcos's work is more advanced. I couldn't help but think of you while I watched his newest video. Perhaps you can find some interesting things in it to reflect upon for new additions to your site. https://youtu.be/5kVsjq0m9TI
Warmest regards,
Cathy

For such a bold, sweeping conclusion, you need to define what you mean by Perception and what is Responsiveness. Otherwise, sounds like self-serving, dogmatic nonsense. — Sir Philo Sophia

You know, I'm really perfectly fine with you having the last word. I am not a competitive, confrontational person. So go for it. I promise I won't respond.

so, according to your definition, you would say that an AI robot machine that has Perception and is Responsiveness to that perception is presumed to be 'Consciousness'? — Sir Philo Sophia

Two words used to describe living consciousness.

'

perhaps — Coben

Perception' and 'Responsiveness' are two words used to define 'Consciousness'. There is nothing I can find that says this is confined to an individual person. If the whole of existence and creation is 'mind' processing information (in reference to my favorite thinkers listed on my profile), ... You should be able to understand my perspective regarding epigenetics.

Epigenetic phenomena are extremely well documented. However I am not quite sure what this has to do with consciousness outside the individual mind. — Coben

Perhaps it would serve us to review the definition or definitions of 'consciousness'.

Ok. I'm glad you have this forum to express your ideas and interpretations of the Weltanschauung and its emergence via semiosis. Isn't it wonderful?! So many words, with so much meaning! Much appreciated. .. Kindly, Catherine

so, do you think full, human level Consciousness is possible to be implemented in an AI machine? Or, only organic wet-wear can possess it? Your arguments/views seem to conclude the later. — Sir Philo Sophia

In light of synechism (continuity), and the necessity of 'otherness' in the process of semiosis, ... 'emergence' clearly is of an organic nature. No matter how sophisticated, AI machines will never 'emerge' and be a natural processing organism of semiosis.

Both/And Principle : My coinage for the holistic principle of Complementarity, as illustrated in the Yin/Yang symbol. Opposing or contrasting concepts are always part of a greater whole. Conflicts between parts can be reconciled or harmonized by putting them into the context of a whole system.
http://blog-glossary.enformationism.info/page10.html — Gnomon

I agree with everything you've said. You and Peirce actually have quite a bit in common. Your 'Complementarity' has much in common with the 'Continuity' of Peirce's synechism. Yours is 'dyadic' within the 'whole', but doesn't the 'whole' constitute the 3rd aspect? Just from a broader perspective? Analyzing the harmonization factors close-up would reveal the 'triadic' nature (interaction via semiosis). This is why 'negation' is so interesting to me. It can be studied in application (science, language, culture)

Perhaps what you and I should be discussing is the differences between your 'non-ideal' Both/And Principal and Peirce's 'objective' idealism. It's important to remember when reflecting on the history of philosophy that these renowned thinkers presented their positions 'in contrast' to other lines of thought during their time, as you so succinctly pointed to in your comments about Descartes (the direction of the conflicts was in place long before his work). I suppose it's what keeps modern day philosophers excited about debating the details of the history of metaphysics.

The history of thought is very much like a river, with organisms floating on top of and treading water, but always subjected to the current. Much the same might be said about information, correct? :smile:

I have no idea what Pierce meant by "negation". But there is an important distinction between NOT (contradiction) and NOT (absence), The latter is an existential qualifier : does not exist. In that sense, it is not just contradictory of the postulate, but destructive.

"That's a negatory, Big Daddy" :smile: — Gnomon

Thank you for your insight, Gnomon. :smile:

This is a subject I have been studying and am very interested in. I think this is excellent evidence of the destructiveness of Ockham's nominalism and Descartes reductionism.

SophistiCat mentioned the difference between negation in linguistics versus negation in mathematics and logic. I would argue that negation in logic and linguistics are historical cousins, and that modern negation doesn't properly take into account the 'NOT' contradiction that you mentioned (see link below about the Jespersen Cycle) .

Since Descartes, science has taken a path of slicing and discarding (negation as rejection) that which is a contradiction, when any contradiction should remain held up in the light of what relation it has to the 'subject of study', 'the entity of focus', etc., whether we are talking about science OR the use of language and how we interact with each other as human beings. From a psychological perspective, it seems to make sense that the misguided influences of dyadic nominalism/dualism/reductionism in our language deviously encourages divisiveness (LOTS of examples in how members interact with each other on this forum). It all makes me wonder about what we have lost, and may never be able to recover, due to the misguided dyadic negation versus the more thorough triadic negation posited by Peirce.

THIS is what I think Charle S. Peirce was trying to get through to Dewey, and why Peirce changed the name of his pragmatism to 'pragmaticism' to distinguish it from William James and John Dewey. He felt his new term for his 'pragmaticism' was too ugly a term to steal and pollute with the American tidal wave of dyadic philosophies of the time. William James said that he "owed everything to Peirce", because he actually took Peirce's work and distorted it to meet the popular desires of the then exciting ontological individualism in the new found America. Peirce didn't publicly admonish James, because James did help Peirce financially, but he was definitely bothered by how his work was distorted.

I'm glad there are scholars today studying the enormous changes that occurred during human history since the time of Duns Scotus when these systems of thought took such a destructive turn. Unfortunately, we can't go back and change that, and we can only try to survive with the legacy handed down to us. I only wish more people understood what happened and how we got here. Perhaps if they understood, more people might step back for a moment when we interact with each other, and take the time to really listen to what they might normally discard in other perspectives, and then perhaps learn more from each other, and make the world a little safer and kinder.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jespersen%27s_Cycle

Here is an excellent video on the history of pragmatism. I think you will enjoy it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xRnqmU66DaQ

When Peirce was at Johns Hopkins, he actually chastised Dewey for not understanding negation.

It's my understanding that instead of 'rejection', negation means 'not'.

"The logical negation of a concept is instead its non-X."
https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1354067X16645297?journalCode=capa

Please elaborate on what you think are the differences in these two perspectives. Thanks.

“Mad Hatter: Would you like a little more tea?
Alice: Well, I haven't had any yet, so I can't very well take more."

How can there be anything without 'Firstness'?

How can 'nothing' be a concept at all, unless you start from the perspective of 'something'?

Top down versus bottom up thinking?

We are limited because from the perspective of self we can only know what is now, the top place to start when thinking from top to bottom. We have no concept of what the bottom may be. What we can only comprehend is that there is always something.

'Nothing' is the complete absence of Firstness. Capturing the in-between of nothingness to somethingness (the birthing of being, an idea, etc) is not an opposite or contrary, it is an emergence of continuity, perhaps from outside in to inside out. Two sides of a spinning coin. Nothingness is the exact image of the edge of the coin, when it is neither heads nor tails.

Just my thoughts.

I've studied Heraclitus for years, and it took me a while to understand how he related his Unity of Opposites to how things change. It's important to remember what he said about "kindling in measures, and going out in measures". I see similarities in Heraclitus and Peirce regarding what is to be revealed in negation and difference. Recognizing something by what it is "not". ... "Measures" ... How we observe change only in "relation".

This video on Heraclitus (audio only) is the best I've heard. Peter Adamson (I'm a big fan) of King's College London has some very insightful things to say, along with the others.

https://youtu.be/W80ToU1tvpI

Offpoint, probably. But Pierce was fond of the number three. Maybe he got there from the Trinity. — Ciceronianus the White

I haven't had time to find the source about Peirce and his interest in the Trinity. I will post it when I have a chance to look it up. It was a site delving into his letters. I remember it had a black background. Very interesting.

As I've mentioned before, different scholars and religions focus on different aspects of Peirce in order to support their own biases. It's time consuming to really get to know him.

"Listening not to me but to the Logos it is wise to agree that all things are one."
- Heraclitus

“Couples are things whole and things not whole, what is drawn together and what is drawn asunder, the harmonious and the discordant. The one is made up of all things, and all things issue from the one.”
- Heraclitus

“The wise is one only. It is unwilling and willing to be called by the name of Zeus.”
- Heraclitus

Whatever name we assign to it, it is the same source of everything in existence that we can sense or point out patterns, but we must also be aware that other beings sense and note patterns in the "medium" differently than humans.

Borrowed" may be a better word. They borrowed so very much.

This particular borrowing (of "logos") was likely a part of the gradual deification of Jesus and his--uncomfortable, I think--identification with the Father and the uncertainly defined third member of the Trinity, the Holy Ghost or Spirit. Jesus wasn't referred to as God in the earlier Gospels, or in Paul, so the concept of logos served developing Christianity well. If, that is, you wanted Jesus to be God and not merely a man or an intermediary, or a lesser heavenly power. — Ciceronianus the White

Agreed.

I'm warming up to you. — Gregory

I'm glad. :)

Perhaps you understand now why I had to take an unconventional approach to introducing myself here. There's no easy way to just put all of this out there.

↪Mapping the Medium

Are you a "recovering Christian"? — Gregory

Not at all.

Although I was baptized Lutheran, my parents were not church goers. My paternal grandmother came from a family of German Lutheran immigrants, so my father wanted to please his mother and maternal grandmother. My mother's side of my family came from Southern Baptist, Church of Christ, and Quakers. They were only sporadic church goers. My maternal grandmother, and my mother (after divorcing my father when I was only 3), both eventually married Jewish men, and they were not attendees of synagogue.

My Jewish stepfather was an atheist. As a child, when my friends invited me to church I was not allowed to go.

My spirituality and intellect were very home-grown, spending a huge amount of time playing in the woods, interacting with animals, reading, and thinking.

When I became an adult, I went on a quest of research and discovery. I wanted to understand the history of philosophy and religion. By this time, I had already acquired a healthy background in biology. Biology, language, and the physical sciences were my favorite subjects in high school. I also enjoyed creative writing and clay sculpting. I attended a teaching zoo in college, as well as studies in world religions/history and creative writing. And when home computers made research more convenient, I was hooked on my adventurous expedition. :)

Along with my studies, I also attended various churches and spiritual gatherings. I enjoyed listening to others tell me their spiritual perspectives. I joined online philosophy and religious forums. I studied the Christian bible inside and out, alongside the Jewish, Islamic, Buddhist, and other perspectives. I was even asked to teach bible study at the local evangelical Lutheran church, until the mutual understanding that my views were a bit too secular for a nominalist, protestant, evangelical church.

I enjoy being around spiritual AND intellectual people, and have often found it difficult to find open-minded combinations of the two. That's probably why I'm single. Ha! ;-)

To answer your question more directly. I am NOT a recovering Christian. I am a Synechist.

Max H. Fisch wrote extensively about Peirce.

As a member of the Charles S. Peirce Society, I have also really enjoyed reading comparison paper after paper in the quarterly journal about the differences between others and Peirce. Lots of great brain food!

https://peirce.sitehost.iu.edu/writings/v1/v1intro.htm

Back to the Logos....

This term was used centuries before Jesus, and Christians (as good sales people do with references) used a familiar term to apply it to Jesus and grab the attention of listeners.

Here is an excellent Harvard site explaining Heraclitus's logos, and you should be able to see my connection to Peirce...

"Since discourse (logos) indeed occupies the central position, as the sole reference of the passage, it sufficed to erase the difference between the word and what, according to the Heraclitean corpus, it expressed, that is, the difference between the logos and the utterances to which the structure deduced from it is applied. Thus the logos was seen as a term of pure substitution, the sign of an objective message."

https://chs.harvard.edu/CHS/article/display/6638.17-the-heraclitean-logos

See if you can read page 6 on that Google books link I posted above. That should shed some light on the topic.

I have led philosophy discussion groups on Peirce. I found that one of the most fascinating things to help others understand about his logic is in how he understood and applied 'negation'. I loved exploring that!

Naturally, I prefer this one. — aletheist

Of course. I like that one too. :)

I recently purchased 'Kosmos Noetos'. A friend told me they found a pdf version online somewhere. It was a special treat for myself. One of the most thorough books on Peirce, and I've read almost all of them.
https://books.google.com/books/about/K%C3%B3smos_Noet%C3%B3s.html?id=a6I7DwAAQBAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=kp_read_button

If God is not immanent, then by this definition He is necessarily transcendent; both pantheism (the world is God) and panentheism (the world is in God) are ruled out. It is therefore untenable to ascribe either of these views to Peirce, as some scholars wrongly do; he was a Protestant Christian theist, although admittedly not a traditionally orthodox one. — aletheist

Clearly there was a reason Peirce attended the Episcopal Church, a midway between Catholic and Protestant. Very different from Lutheranism. I have studied this in-depth. I was baptised Lutheran, and recognize the nominalism within it.

This is one good reference that may shed some light on his views.....
https://www.jstor.org/stable/40321287?seq=1

Peirce actually sought to understand the trinity as 'Logos'.
— Mapping the Medium
Citation, please. The first verses of the Gospel of John explicitly identify the Logos (Word) with only one Person of the Trinity, the Son who became flesh and dwelt among us. The best treatment of the Trinity from a Peircean standpoint that I have come across so far is Andrew Robinson's 2010 book, God and the World of Signs: Trinity, Evolution, and the Metaphysical Semiotics of C. S. Peirce. — aletheist

I will get back to you with the citation. Again, I was trying to relate this to something Gregory might understand. I have good citations. Part of Peirce's trying to understand this was his 'unconventional' perspective as a member of the Episcopal Church.

searched "conscience charles peirce" on google, and nothing came up — Gregory

You might consider reading Mikhail Bakhtin's 'Toward a Philosophy of the Act'. Peirce and Bakhtin had much in common. And there are references to proper ways of treating others all throughout Peirce's writings, usually in reference to 'Being'.

According to Peirce, there is indeed both immanent mind and transcendent mind, but only the latter is properly called God.
I do not mean by God a being merely "immanent in Nature," but I mean that Being who has created every content of the world of ideal possibilities, of the world of physical facts, and the world of all minds, without any exception whatever.
— Peirce, R 843, 1908 — aletheist

Yes. I realize that. I was only trying to relate it to something Gregory might understand. .. Peirce said that he and Spinoza had much in common

I don't even like the guy. — Gregory

The world is full of people who don't like other people because they don't understand them.

Perhaps this will help, Gregory. Watch this very easy to understand video about Process Philosophy. Think of how the mind processes information, then try to adjust your perspective by a few degrees once you've seen this very short video.

One thing that makes Peirce, Whitehead, Spinoza, and a few others so difficult for Protestant Christians (I highly suspect you are a Protestant) to understand is that your faith teaches you that you are an immanent creation of God's, and God is transcendent and 'out there', 'up there', 'man in the sky', etc. (separate realms, if you will), whereas to understand Peirce means to understand that reality... 'Mind'.. is immanent AND transcendent. Whether you want to call that mind 'God' is left up to the interpreter.

You have been taught that Jesus was God incarnate (as immanent man), always idolizing the dualistic nature of God being separate from His creation (this is exactly what the title of this post is about, the theological origins of nominalism and dualism). Peirce actually sought to understand the trinity as 'Logos'. I do hope you fully understand 'Logos'. If so, you should be able to grasp Peirce once you study him more deeply. If not, I recommend you learn more about Heraclitus. Let me know if you would like some links.

Here's the video. I hope it helps you understand. .......
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Q6cDp0C-I8&list=PL5r3bNEcthJDR9HwurZbu9dTrFbPpzVrp&index=14&t=0s

Colour is a fascinating subject. When I see an array of flowers, each having its own unique special blend of hues, on a summer day, I am awestruck by the beauty, and the fact that each particular colour is something created by that individual living being. But I don't see what this has to do with the reality of continuity. In fact, it seems more like evidence of the reality of individuality. — Metaphysician Undercover

For you to see the color, it takes you and the flowers, plus the other sensory aspects of the medium at the time you are looking at them. The color is not confined to the flower. Your seeing it is caused by many things other than you and the flower, and without that combination of all aspects (which we are still discovering) of the medium at that moment in time, you would not see the color, or perhaps that same shade as another person would. We each see color differently because of this. It is manifested by the continuum. And other life forms would see it even more differently than humans.

Since Consciousness is a process, it can start and stop. When Consciousness stops, the Self/Soul dis-organizes, and the body dies. But the energy (EnFormAction) is always conserved. It continues to flow through the world. So, you could say that the Information that formed the Self/Soul re-enters the main stream of EnFormAction (G*D-Mind in action). Like a drop in the ocean, it is no longer a distinct object. — Gnomon

Agreed.

This is the unsupported premise, the thing taken for granted which no one seems to be able to back up with reasonable principles. — Metaphysician Undercover

Perhaps examining the science of color might shed some light on this.....

"The interdisciplinary field of animal coloration is growing rapidly, spanning questions about the diverse ways that animals use pigments and structures to generate color, the underlying genetics and epigenetics, the perception of color, how color information is integrated with information from other senses, and general principles underlying color’s evolution and function. People working in the field appreciate linkages between these parallel lines of enquiry, but outsiders need the easily navigable roadmap that we provide here."

"Here, a group of evolutionary biologists, behavioral ecologists, psychologists, optical physicists, visual physiologists, geneticists, and anthropologists review this diverse area of science, daunting to the outsider, and set out what we believe are the key questions for the future. These are how nanoscale structures are used to manipulate light; how dynamic changes in coloration occur on different time scales; the genetics of coloration (including key innovations and the extent of parallel changes in different lineages); alternative perceptions of color by different species (including wavelengths that we cannot see, such as ultraviolet); how color, pattern, and motion interact; and how color works together with other modalities, especially odor. From an adaptive standpoint, color can serve several functions, and the resulting patterns frequently represent a trade-off among different evolutionary drivers, some of which are nonvisual (e.g., photoprotection). These trade-offs can vary between individuals within the same population, and color can be altered strategically on different time scales to serve different purposes. Lastly, interspecific differences in coloration, sometimes even observable in the fossil record, give insights into trait evolution. The biology of color is a field that typifies modern research: curiosity-led, technology-driven, multilevel, interdisciplinary, and integrative."

"Colors in animals and plants are produced by pigments and nanostructures (2). Although knowledge of mechanisms that manipulate ultraviolet (UV) to infrared wavelengths is accumulating (3), we lack an appreciation of the developmental processes involved in cellular structure and pattern formation at optical scales (nanometers to microns). Nonetheless, the field of soft condensed matter physics (4) holds great potential for new insights into optical architectures. This will be a critical foundation for future understanding of ordered self-assembly in colored biological materials, from β-keratin in birds’ feathers (5) to chiral or uniaxial chitin structures in beetles (6). Such knowledge can illuminate the costs, constraints, and evolution of coloration."

" Perhaps the most striking case where the rules of “normal” color vision do not apply are stomatopods (mantis shrimps); these have many photoreceptor classes (up to 12) but relatively poor color discrimination ability (36) (Fig. 2)."

"Mechanisms of vision and visually guided behavior should be studied from the top down, as well as from the bottom up."

"Importantly, visual properties can be substantially affected by other sensory modalities. For instance, swallowtail butterfly responses to colors are modified by host plant odors (54)."

"Nonvisual sensory information alters how receivers respond to color signals."

"Whether and how organisms resolve trade-offs depends on the shape of the fitness curve resulting from different selective forces."

https://science.sciencemag.org/content/357/6350/eaan0221

The bottom line is that any dualistic perception is very limited. We sense much more than what is pointing outward (observed) from 'self' (subject), but we do not recognize it from a dualistic perspective. When we remove 'otherness' from the equation, perception (measurement) ceases. We need to focus more on that missing component that was disregarding from Ockham forward. Thank goodness there are several fields of study engaging in what has been overlooked for centuries. It is my hope that advances will be made in time to address some of the damage.

This is a favorite video on my educational playlist ('My Freedom from Nominalism Worldview'). ... Rocco Gangle does an EXCELLENT job of explaining Spinoza, language, and relational identity. ... https://youtu.be/osySxRALhSo

We recognize subject only in relation to object. A world of verbs and adjectives, so to speak. This is why we have no memories of early development. Our sense of self 'became' due to the action of verbs and the recognition via adjectives. Nominalism reduced our adult approach to the world down to dismissing the importance of the verb and adjective. Even your question has a 'slash' (slice) between subject and object.

I enjoy life due to actions and recognitions.