SUO: RE: interpreter vs interpretant
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-standard-upper-ontology@majordomo.ieee.org
> [mailto:owner-standard-upper-ontology@majordomo.ieee.org]On Behalf Of
> Seth Russell
> Sent: Saturday, 19 January 2002 6:50
> To: Jon Awbrey; Stand Up Ontology
> Cc: John F Sowa
> Subject: SUO: interpreter vs interpretant
>
>
>
> From: "Jon Awbrey" <jawbrey@oakland.edu>
>
> > I have even found myself accused of the dreaded
> > sins of "agentism", "individualism", "psychologism" for doing no
> > more than referring to the "interpreter" in the very same way
> > that Peirce did, as a soppy embodiment of and a way-station
> > to the more fundamental, but more difficult to explain,
> > notion of an interpretant sign.
>
> What is an 'interpretant sign' ?
>
> I would like to tease out a acceptable ontology of these concepts:
>
> 1) interpreter
> 2) interpretant
> 3) memories (examples might be a psychological state or a
> computer data base
> record)
>
Peirce's trichotomy approach (and so Hegel etc) is a little 'flawed' in that
it contains a dual occupancy of thirdness in the form of the
mediation/representation and as such requires context to determine which
term is applicable. This requirement defeats the whole purpose of a set of
universal categories where there should be no local context dependency
required as part of the derivation process.
The firstness, secondness, thirdness reflect the relationships of stimulus
(specific quality), response (as in aesthetic, ethics, logic).
Mediation/represention emerges from the processing of the WHOLE
stimulus/response event to form a representation in the form of a symbol
and/or habit such that the stimulus/response is 'refined' in the form of
symbol/habit where the symbol formation allows for generalisation and the
response formation DOES allow for context-sensitivity and so we move 'above'
the mindless stimulus/response of the general purpose nervous system.
The mediation process includes Seth's emphasis on memories as a source of
feedback in the process where mediation may be simply the linking of the
stimulus to existing patterns and the refinement of existing habits to 'fit'
with the current context.
The 'loop' process within thirdness is where the dynamics is in the
oscillation of mediation-representation due to the ever ongoing 'need' to
refine responses and re-label stimuli; the species-emphasis is on the
establishment of 'good' habits and so the creation of a set of habits that
work so well in the context that individual and context are perceived to be
totally intergrated. The advantage of a universal set of categories (and so
sources of habit formation) is that habits become general purpose and so
usable with little modification in ANY context and at the same time we can
recruit a habit linked to a different context as a general pattern source
for a new, but similar, context.
The mediation/representation emphasis reflects the encapsulation and
localisation of the more universal behaviour of genes (response) and
environment (stimulus); thus the 'mindless' mediation/representation of the
species over millions of years has become 'mindful' and localised in the
individual. Once a symbol/habit has been produced energy is 'reduced' back
to the 'mindless' level of stimulus/response where the symbol can elicit the
same response as does the original stimulus.
Chris.
------------------
Chris Lofting
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