Re: SUO: Re: Sign Relations
Jon,
I'm intrigued by your formalization. I wonder if I could make a
suggestion about notation. While most mathematics and logic texts use
single letters for concepts and relations and introduce notations freely,
I'd suggest that we use the proposed SUO-KIF and something like what David
Whitten has begun with the structural ontology. I think that will aid in
understanding people's proposals and once agreement is reached on
particular proposals, we won't then be faced with the problem of having to
translate from the author's notation into the standard.
In your message below I take Object, Sign and Interpretant to be
classes. I take it that A, and B are instances of some Agent, as are i and
u. R is a ternary relation we might call 'interpretation'. I'm not clear
why A and B are both 'interpreters' and also in the set of Objects. What
is the semantics you intend for "O = (A,B)" ? Why does R(A) have a
different set of possible values from R(B)? What are the semantics of R?
These may be imperceptive questions and they're not intended as
criticism but hopefully they'll motivate more detail and use of something
closer to the logical notation that is likely to be in the SUO.
Adam
At 11:00 PM 9/28/2000 -0400, Jon Awbrey wrote:
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>Semiotic SIG,
>
>I think it may serve the discussion at this point to introduce a couple
>of concrete examples of sign relations, and perhaps thereby to dispell
>the suspicion that all of this pragmatic sign theory stuff is just too
>ill-defined to touch down anywhere. This is a strategy that my former
>advisor, Thomas G. Windeknecht, recommended to me at a critical point
>in the development of my dissertation work, exhorting me in this wise,
>by means of a singular interrogative plus a threefold imperative:
>
>1. "How simple can it be and still be interesting?"
>2. "Examples! Examples! Examples!"
>
>To make a long story short, I shortly thereafter came up with the following
>pair of associated sign relations, which, for all of their evident simplicity,
>can be used to illustrate many of the most distinctive features of the
>subject.
>
>You can start out by imagining that two people, A and B, have a language
>that is restricted to just their own proper names, "A" and "B", plus the
>first and second person pronouns, "I" and "you", which will here be
>schematized as "i" and "u", respectively.
>
>To specify a sign relation one has to give three domains,
>the Object, Sign, and Interpretant domains, schematized
>here as O, S, and I, respectively.
>
>For this example, let us consider the two sign relations, R(A) and R(B),
>corresponding to the usages of the two "interpreters", A and B, respectively.
>
>(Notation: I will use "€" for "element of" and "ç" for "subset of".)
>
>We have the following:
>
>R(A), R(B) ç O x S x I,
>
>O = {A, B},
>
>S = {"A", "B", "i", "u"},
>
>I = {"A", "B", "i", "u"}.
>
>R(A) has the following eight triples of the form <o, s, i>:
>
> <A, "A", "A">
> <A, "A", "i">
> <A, "i", "A">
> <A, "i", "i">
> <B, "B", "B">
> <B, "B", "u">
> <B, "u", "B">
> <B, "u", "u">
>
>R(B) has the following eight triples of the form <o, s, i>:
>
> <A, "A", "A">
> <A, "A", "u">
> <A, "u", "A">
> <A, "u", "u">
> <B, "B", "B">
> <B, "B", "i">
> <B, "i", "B">
> <B, "i", "i">
>
>Following a usage of C.S. Peirce, the elements of a sign relation R,
>that is, the ordered triples of the form <o, s, i> € R, are known as
>its "elementary sign relations". (This is roughly Peirce's meaning.)
>
>That is all there is to this kind of model of the sign relations in question.
>Semiosis, the Movie, is another story altogether. Angel, with his mind fixed
>on Buffy, might have the following sequence of thoughts, suitably abbreviated,
>pass through his mind: "B", "B", "u", "B", "u", "u", "B", "u", ..., only one
>of many possible reveries that are due to his obsessive repetition compulsion.
>
>What is the most that we can say about the bearing of these
>abstract sign relations on the concrete transits of semiosis?
>Just this: The sign relations for the interpreters A and B
>constrain the transitions in their respective processes of
>semiosis, but do not of necessity determine them uniquely.
>
>More, later,
>
>Jon Awbrey
>
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Adam Pease
Teknowledge
(650) 424-0500 x571