What's a Word Worth? - Cleaning Up the Logic (Piercian Semiotics #3)

[justira]

What's a Word Worth is a new column by justira about the mechanics of writing. In this column, I examine the actual writing of every single book I read, focusing on how it conveys meaning and whether the writing works for me as an editor, reader, and fellow writer. My analysis will be based on the Peircian semiotic framework, explained in the first few posts of the column.

Welcome to the third post in my introductory series for this column! The first four posts will introduce readers to Peircian semiotics, which is the framework I use to analyze writing. If you're new to this column, please check the first and second posts in this series. If you're following along live and are returning after a week away, you might benefit from taking a look at the review section of the previous post.

Inference and the Logical Order of Determination in the Sign

Up to this point we have talked vaguely about "a sign denoting its object", or a sign's capacity to stand for an object (like the clipart light bulb from the previous post has the capacity to stand for any light bulb). Having assembled the basic Peircian semiotic, we are poised on the brink of turning our discussion to metaphors and how they work and why I think icons are important and Saussure was a tool for dismissing them.

But first! We must pause and be more clear about the role of inference and the logical order of determination in the sign-relation. This will be a much shorter post, but also a denser one, if the header up there wasn't a clue. I'll try to break this down as best as I can. This post leans heavily on the philosophical side of Peirce, which is a bit of a change from the focus we've had so far.

Anyway!

First, we gotta remember that Peirce's semiotic, and the principle of iconicity in particular, is a structure of philosophical rather than linguistic concepts: Peirce's system was meant to deal with all kinds of phenomena, unlike the narrowly verbocentrist task defined by Saussure's Cours. It is true that language as a system deals primarily with symbols, and the Cours deals admirably with that facet of language. However, as Peirce aims for a much broader subject, his semiotic framework is equipped to deal with a larger variety of concepts. As such, the concept of iconicity is wrapped up in "the structure of inference and Peirce's conception of cognition and scientific activity. [...] Peirce defined the means of discovery — inference — and the objects of the processes of discovery — signs — as elements of the same semiotic system, and made them subject to the same constraints and definitions"⁽¹⁾. What this means is that signs are how we learn about the world, and in order to understand that, we have to understand the logical order by which inference happens in the sign-relation, since it's all part of one semiotic system.

Peirce's belief in the inferential nature of cognition is central to understanding the actual functioning of the sign-relation and the logic of the icon — recall that icons (embedded in dicent indices) are the only type of sign from which we can learn(=infer). Since knowledge is gained by inference, and it is through perception that we infer qualities, existent phenomena, and signs or relations, a complete and systematic logic must be able to deal with the full range of sensations of daily life⁽²⁾. This is part of the reason that Peirce's semiotic is equipped to deal with the everyday occurrences of social life, and is a good framework not just for formal linguistics, but for social linguistics and other things like analyzing writing.

It also means that inference and logical order play an important role in the sign-relation. Where we have before talked vaguely of a representamen referring to an object, we can now state precisely that it is the object that determines⁽³⁾ the representamen, such that the logical order of determination is object → sign → interpretant. What this means is that the sign is what mediates between the object and the interpretant; there is no direct path from object to interpretant as there would be in a stimulus-response (as opposed to inference-based) theory of cognition. This is illustrated in Fig 3.1, where the arrows indicate order of determination and the dotted line represents the impermissible direct path from object to interpretant.

Figure 3.1. The logical order of determination of the sign. The order of determination is from object to representamen to interpretant. The dotted line represents the forbidden direct connection between object and interpretant.

The interpretant is mediately — that is, indirectly, rather than immediately, directly — determined by the object. Relating back to inference, it is because the object determines the representamen that we can infer things about the object from the sign. This is easiest to see with our example of the footprint on the beach. Remember how we read dicent indices? It's because the sign — the footprint — was determined by the object — the foot — that we can learn things about the object from the sign.

Let's go over what Peirce said on the topic, then break it down and provide examples. Bear with me, we're going to primary source material for a bit here!

Peirce provides the following examples to illustrate that this is the only possible order of determination:

There must be an action of the object upon the sign to render the latter true. If a colonel hands a paper to an orderly and says "You will go immediately and deliver this to Captain Hanno" and if the orderly does so, we do not say the colonel told the truth; we say the orderly was obedient, since it was not the orderly's conduct which determined the colonel to say what he did, but the colonel's speech which determined the orderly's action. (CP 5.554 as quoted in Jappy §2.2)

Moreover, the object not only brings the sign into existence but also determines its structure. The object informs the sign; this is of import for iconicity in particular. What is imparted on or communicated to the representamen is pure form or quality, because quality (Firstness) is the only monadic (as opposed to dyadic or triadic) phenomenon, the only stable, indivisible quality that exists eternally and independently. We can see what this means after we examine one of Peirce's formulations of the sign-function:

The Icon has no dynamical connection with the object it represents; it simply happens that its qualities resemble those of that object, and excite analogous sensations in the mind for which it is a likeness. But it really stands unconnected to them. The index is physically connected with its object; they make an organic pair, but the interpreting mind has nothing to do with this connection, except remarking it, after it is established. The symbol is connected with its object by virtue of the idea of the symbol-using mind, without which no such connection would exist. (CP 2.299 as quoted in Jappy §2.3)

This should sound familiar from the previous post. Now to get into detail: The representational capacity of the icon is grounded in qualities that it possesses. And the representamen possesses these qualities independent of object and interpretant. It only comes to signify, to mean anything, when an object determines it and it is in turn used to excite an interpretant in the receiver (recall that signs are catalysts for effects).

So, I might scribble a bunch of lines on a sheet of paper without any intention to draw a particular thing, and the scribble will possess whatever qualities it comes to possess. Then I may ask you to look for a picture of a duck in the scribble, and suddenly my scribble will become an icon of a duck, because some intersection of lines in it happened to resemble the outline of a duck. My scribble was not meant to be a duck, but happened to have the potential to stand for a duck because it possessed some qualities in common with ducks. We see, then, how the object determines the representamen, and how an iconic representamen is such as it is independent of its object and only becomes a sign for its object when we call upon particular qualities of it by asking it to stand for a particular object.

Another example of this is ambiguous image illusions.

Figure 3.2. The famous rabbit-duck illusion. (source)

Does this picture represent a duck, or a rabbit? It has the potential to stand for both, but it only becomes one or the other when we pick an object for it. Say I tell you to look for a duck again. You see the open bill and the eye and, the shape of the head, and the picture becomes an icon of a duck. The representamen mediates between the object and the interpretant. (Or it can become a rabbit if you look for a rabbit, with the bill becoming ears and the back of the head becoming the nose.)

Going back to our quantum mechanics analogy from the first post, signs are like electrons or photons: they are wave functions, entities of probability or possibility. An object collapses the wave function: the sign becomes definitely one thing or the other.

Peirce provides the following elucidation of the icon:

An Icon is a sign which refers to the Object that it denotes merely by virtue of characters of its own, and which it possesses, just the same, whether any such Object exists or not... Anything whatever, be it quality, existent individual, or law, is an Icon of anything, in so far as it is like that thing and used as a sign of it. (CP 2.247 as quoted in Jappy §2.3)

My scribble from before possessed whatever qualities it did regardless of anything else. The same scribble could well have turned out to possess some qualities in common with a horse and could have been taken as a sign for a horse, but whatever these qualities are, they were inherent in the representamen. In this sense, an icon is monadic, possessing, by itself, the capacity for signhood as long as it has at least one quality.

We can also now clarify what we mean by an object informing a representamen, or an object communicating form to a representamen. We do not mean that an actual physical transfer of qualities must occur (though it might with a footprint or wax seal, for example, or the weathervane we've discussed before, where the wind transfers its direction to the vane), but rather "the appropriateness of one thing standing for another thing by virtue of at least one common quality"⁽⁴⁾. For example, in our previous post we discussed the stick figure. Does it stand for a human or an asari? It has four qualities: a head, a torso, four limbs, and it stands upright. By these qualities, it can appropriately stand for either a human or an asari.

Let us turn, within this framework, to the index. In the case of the icon, the existence of an object is not necessary for the representamen to have the capacity (as long as it has at least one quality) to serve as a sign for a particular object. The index, however, is defined precisely by its dependence on an object that is contiguous with it or affects it and thus makes it fit to serve as a sign for that object. This is most evident in dicent indices, wherein, without the cause, no effect can be read into the sign. A weathervane by itself cannot refer to the wind⁽⁵⁾ until it has been actually affected by the wind. Because the wind has caused it to point a certain direction, it can then serve to tell us something about the wind: to function as a sign for the wind. In short, a weathervane is literally meaningless without the wind that determines it. Such is Peirce's definition of the index, and the dicent index in particular, which also serves to elucidate how an index must have an embedded icon:

An Index is a sign which refers to the Object that it denotes by virtue of being really affected by that Object. [...] In so far as the Index is affected by the Object, it necessarily has some Quality in common with the Object, and it is in respect to these that it refers to the Object. It does therefore, involve an Icon, although an Icon of a peculiar kind; and it is not the mere resemblance of its Object, even in these respects which makes it a sign, but it is the actual modification of it by the Object. (CP 2.248 as quoted in Jappy §2.3)

Thus, our weathervane shares a directional quality with the wind: it points in the direction the wind is blowing. It follows that an index is dyadic, although indices, like icons, obviously cannot function as signs until they determine an interpretant. Note that this dyadic relationship that happens in indices is pre-semiotic, while representation using icons is semiotic. We'll return to this in a moment. Thus, as soon as our weathervane was actually affected by the wind, it had the capacity to serve as a sign but could not actually do so until we received it as a sign and formed an interpretant for it — until we read it and formed an idea of the direction of the wind from it.

Finally, the symbol is completely triadic, requiring not only the representamen and object, but also an interpretant before it has the capacity to function as a sign. A symbol "is a sign which would lose the character which renders it a sign if there were no interpretant." (CP 2.304 as quoted in Jappy §2.3) Peirce also provides a fuller definition:

A Symbol is a sign which refers to the Object that it denotes by virtue of a law, usually an association of general ideas, which operates to cause the Symbol to be referring to that Object. It is thus itself a general type or law. [...] As such, it acts through a Replica⁽⁶⁾ . [.. ] Now that which is general has its being in the instances which it will determine. [...] The Symbol will indirectly, through the association or other law, be affected by those instances; and thus the Symbol will involve a sort of Index, although an index of a peculiar kind. (CP 2.249)

Note that Peirce says a symbol has its "being" in the "instances which it will determine" — remember how legisigns are instantiated by sinsigns? You need at least two sinsigns (which in turn have qualisigns) to make up a legisign, so that they can be classed together, and an idea or cultural law form to associate the two. So a legisign necessarily points to — indexes — sinsigns.

Going back to logical order of determination and relations: This means that, if the interpretant were to vanish, not only would no relation happen between the object and representamen, but the representamen would cease to have the capacity to function as a sign for that object at all. So, if I were to say "dog" in the absence of a law to associate it with some object (any law would do, even if it didn't refer to domesticated canines but instead related an occurrence of "dog" to invasion by aliens or to an all-powerful being in the sky), then that instance of the word "dog" would at best be a nonsense syllable, not a sign, or at the very least not a symbol. It may be a rhematic index that takes me, the utterer, as the object, but it would have no real "meaning".

We can now return to Peirce's definitions of icons, indices, and symbols in terms of what kinds of connections they have with their objects. What Peirce is referring to is that the iconic relation is a "relation of reason", while the indexical relation is a "real relation".

A relation of reason is a relation between two things such that if one of the two were to disappear, the relation still remains. We can see how this is an iconic relation: when a representamen shares qualities with its object, if we were to remove the object or leave it unspecified, the qualities that related the two would still be present in the representamen; the qualities themselves are not affected. A relation of reason requires human cognition or intervention — recall our emphasis on the cultural dependence of similarity and the social construction of qualities. The following might be an example of such a relation: Thomas Jefferson and Alexander Hamilton are both Americans, and as such are in at least one capacity iconic of each other: they share the quality of Americanness. (They also share the qualities of being male, white⁽⁷⁾, dead, etc., all of which are as culturally constructed as the idea of being American.) If Hamilton were to vanish from existence, Jefferson's Americanness would still be intact.

An indexical relation, on the other hand, is a real relation. This is a relation such that if one of the participants were to disappear, the relation disappears as well — this closely recalls our discussion of the index's dependence on a second element, its object. Marriage is a real relation: one cannot be a spouse without there also being at least one other spouse to be married to, and vice-versa. The existence of a husband points to, is indexical of, the existence of another husband, or a wife or spouse. If either relate were to vanish, then no marriage is there. (Notice that this is different from one of the persons dying — they would still have participated in the relation, and the remaining participant is still thought of as a husband or wife or spouse, but a widowed one.) A partnership of any kind is a real relation: there is no such thing as a singular, lone partner; the existence of one partner points to the existence of at least one other partner.

In this sense, we come to understand the order of determination in the sign-relation. While the representamen may exist as a thing in itself, its capacity as a sign is determined by its object. It can then, as a sign, in turn determine an interpretant. This understanding is necessary for a discussion of iconicity.

Finally, we are ready to talk about metaphors and other types of icons! That will be the next, and last, post in this Peirce series.

___________________________

For now, a brief review:

Object → Sign/Representamen → Interpretant

The logical order of the sign. The representamen has the capacity or potential to act as a sign, but what it stands for can only be determined by its object, at which point the sign mediates between the object and the interpretant.

Relation of Reason

A relation between two things such that, if one of them were to disappear, the relation would still remain. Roses and stoplights can both be red, and are thus iconic of each other. If history were altered such that stoplights were some other colour, the redness of the rose — its capacity to be an icon of other red things — is not altered. Relations of reason require a thinking being to apprehend them.

Real Relation

A relation between two things such that, if one of the things were to disappear, the relation would disappear as well. A partnership or marriage is a real relation: there have to be at least two people in them, or else the relationship doesn't exist.

Thanks for reading!

Notes

1. Jappy, A. "Iconicity, Hypoiconicity." Digital Encyclopedia of Charles S. Peirce. Retrieved 23/09/2016, from http://www.digitalpeirce.fee.unicamp.br/jappy/hypjap.htm. (back to text)


2. Jappy §1. (back to text)


3. By "determine" here I don't mean "fully determines", but more along the line of "constrains" or "imposes limits on". (back to text)


4. Jappy §2.3. (back to text)


5. Although it may, perhaps, be an icon of a rooster or arrow, but we are considering its fitness to refer to the wind in particular. Note, however, that the weathervane's inherent qualities, such as its shape, render it an appropriate icon for a rooster or arrow. But without having been affected by the wind, the vane cannot serve as an index for the wind. (back to text)


6. "Replica" was another of Peirce's terms for a sinsign or token. (back to text)


7. Or not white. (back to text)