Re: SUO: Re: Re: Monosemy, Semantics, and Natural Language

[Danny Ayers <danny666@virgilio.it>]

John F. Sowa wrote:

>
> Pat,
>
> Another way to put it is that anything and
> everything is a potential sign.  Whether it is
> considered as a sign depends on how somebody
> interprets it.
>
> PC> I take it that the act of interpretation
> > causes physical phenomena to acquire the status
> > of a "sign"?   In that case smoke rising from
> > a fire would not be a sign unless there is some
> > cognitive agent that notices it?
>
> It's like a meadow, which is a potential camping
> ground whether or not anybody ever sees it.
> But when somebody decides to use it as such,
> it becomes a camping ground.
>
> The word "potential" is important.


Hmm, so returning to the temperature sensor analogy, what if that was 
hooked up to a heating system? Aren't we dealing with the same kind of 
(errrm) actors even if there isn't a true cognitive agent involved. In 
this case a sensor, a communications path, a receiver and an actuator. A 
cognitive agent could observe the system and however their personal 
interpretation varied, the internal interpretation of 'temperature' by 
the agent that controlled the heat would be constant.
I suppose it's getting into Chinese Room territory - but in that 
scenario, can the signs be treated as parts of an ontology?

Cheers,
Danny.