Talk:Charles Peirce

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/Archive 1

Contents

[edit] Misinformative Citation Changes

Dear 132.181.160.60, If you have questions about my citations then ask me here. Please do not change my citations without asking me first. The changes that you are making are not just stylistic, they are incorrect. I have the physical texts in front of me when I code the citations, I am coding them correctly the first time, and I don't like having to go back through a stack of books that I have already put aside to redo something you messed up. Just for one instance, square brackets around an article or chapter title indicate a title that was supplied by the editors, not the author. Jon Awbrey 06:48, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Vandalbot

Can anybody explain to me why this Vandalbot just wiped out a day's work on the Charles Peirce article? Thanks, Jon Awbrey 19:24, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

Okay, I figured it out and reverted, but is there any way to block that CE-inflammed-idiotbot from attacking this article? Jon Awbrey 19:57, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Sign Relations

Another quote to digest for the section on sign relations. Jon Awbrey 22:48, 3 January 2006 (UTC)

| A 'Sign', or 'Representamen', is a First which stands
| in such a genuine triadic relation to a Second, called
| its 'Object', as to be capable of determining a Third,
| called its 'Interpretant', to assume the same triadic
| relation to its Object in which it stands itself to
| the same Object.
|
| The triadic relation is 'genuine', that is, its three members are
| bound together by it in a way that does not consist in any complexus
| of dyadic relations. That is the reason the Interpretant, or Third,
| cannot stand in a mere dyadic relation to the Object, but must stand
| in such a relation to it as the Representamen itself does.
|
| Nor can the triadic relation in which the Third stands be merely similar
| to that in which the First stands, for this would make the relation of the
| Third to the First a degenerate Secondness merely. The Third must indeed
| stand in such a relation, and thus must be capable of determining a Third
| of its own; but besides that, it must have a second triadic relation in
| which the Representamen, or rather the relation thereof to its Object,
| shall be its own (the Third's) Object, and must be capable of determining
| a Third to this relation. All this must equally be true of the Third's
| Third and so on endlessly; and this, and more, is involved in the familiar
| idea of a Sign; and as the term Representamen is here used, nothing more
| is implied.
|
| A 'Sign' is a Representamen with a mental Interpretant.
|
| Possibly there may be Representamens that are not Signs.
|
| Thus, if a sunflower, in turning towards the sun, becomes by that very act
| fully capable, without further condition, of reproducing a sunflower which
| turns in precisely corresponding ways toward the sun, and of doing so with
| the same reproductive power, the sunflower would become a Representamen of
| the sun.
|
| But 'thought' is the chief, if not the only, mode of representation.
|
| C.S. Peirce, "Syllabus" (c. 1902), 'Collected Papers', CP 2.274

[edit] Sections 4.3-4.5 are disturbingly idiosyncratic

I am deeply dismayed at how the vast part of this entry, sections 4.3-4.5, now consists of an overly long and highly idiosyncratic interpretation of Peirce written by a single person, Jon Awbrey. Awbrey states that his prose is taken from a Ph.D. proposal. Was that Ph.D. ever completed? If so, has Awbrey ever published parts of that thesis? If the answer to both questions is No, it would appears that he is using Wikipedia as a way of disseminating ideas he cannot disseminate in any other way.

There is a substantial body of interpretive literature on Peirce, a fair bit of it cited in parts of the entry not written by Awbrey. This entry should be respectful of that literature, the way an encyclopedia article on any subject should be respect the relevant literature. Those who have made material contributions to the Peirce literature, I call "professional Peircians." More specifically, a professional Peircian is someone who has published at least one article since 1980 in the Transactions of the CSP Society. I submit that sections 4.3-4.5 of this entry would not pass muster with any professional Peircian. The 1995 article jointly authored with Susan Awbrey, recently added to the Secondary Literature, does not Jon a Peirce authority make.

It was Peirce the logician that first caught my eye some years ago, then the polymath and tragic figure. I am emphatically not an authority on Peirce the philosopher. But I have read some of the secondary literature, and that literature does not read at all like what Awbrey writes. For instance, much of that literature grants pride of place to the Categories. I grant that Goudge (1950) and Murphey (1961) are dated, but I like their sober methodical manner. For that matter, I like the sort of people who become Peirce specialists. I also agree with those who argue that one must always keep in mind that Peirce was educated as a scientist and was a serious practitioner of fairly humble forms of science. He had fair knowledge of the philosophical mathematics of the latter 19th century (e.g., Dedekind, Cantor, Clifford, Kempe, Sylvester). The story of how Peirce influenced James, Royce, and Dewey, who in turn influenced Lewis, Nagel, Morris Cohen, and eventually much of American philosophy, has yet to be written.

Robert Lane had nothing to do with section 4.2, and has yet to comment on how accurately it captures his thinking.202.36.179.65 11:29, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

I do not intend to dally over ad hominem remarks. I could not find much in the way of specific questions or substantive comments in what is written above except perhaps the concern expressed over the placement of the section on Categories. Let me just say this much about the organizational difficulties of expositing Peirce's work. Due to the complex entanglements and deep interrelatedness of almost all of his most basic ideas, it is often necessary to give each topic an informal introduction and a casual development on the first few mentions, saving the more systematic treatment until a later stage, when the mutually implicated topics have also been introduced and developed to some degree in parallel. That is the approach that I am taking with the Categories, among many others. Jon Awbrey 22:34, 6 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Length and confusion

This article's getting way too long and convoluted. I suggest splitting off the more complicated theories, etc. into their own articles, that'll help make things more managable. I think some of the stuff here is related to the graphical proof that just showed up at Peirce's law, but this stuff is just too dense for me, I can't make head nor tail of it. At very least, the graphical notation being used there needs to be split off into its own page, possibly along with a few sections from here, then linked too.

Once the page has been divvied up, it'll be easier for others to go in and add less technical explanations. Even if they added one now, it'd get lost in all of this text.

The best person to do the splitting is probably Jon Awbrey. He's been doing most of the work here lately, so presumably he understands it all, which I most definitely do not.

-FunnyMan 14:46, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

Dear FunnyMan and TWIC, I think you are right, and that some sorts of spin-offs are probably inevitable with a thinker as complex and spread out as Peirce, and I have been keeping that eventuality in mind from the beginning, in particular with regard to the coordinate articles on pragmatism, pragmaticism, pragmatic maxim, consensus theory of truth, normative science, and several others that will no doubt come to mind as time goes on. Probably the best way to do that is just to let it develop naturally, continuing to stuff and bake this bird until the drumsticks, wings, etc. fall off the bones on their own. So I'll go with that plan for the next week or so. Jon Awbrey 15:00, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

P.S. I've added an article on logical graphs where I'll begin collecting and clarifying the material pertaiming to that subject. As a general rule, it's helpful if general readers and interested editors provide information about what exactly they find confusing, etc., otherwise a writer has to try and guess where more work is needed the most, which is likely to end up making the piece longer and not always less confusing. Thanks, Jon Awbrey 17:05, 7 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Organization & Coordinate Articles

I've begun coordinate articles on inquiry, logical graphs, and sign relations to carry away some of the load on this one, and plan to write shorter synopses of this material within the Charles Peirce article, but it may take a while to work out the best balance between the collateral articles and their synopses here. Jon Awbrey 16:40, 8 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Definitions

I will collect here some of Peirce's basic definitions, that will need to be quoted or excerpted for the main article or one of its coordinate articles. Jon Awbrey 13:42, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Category = predicament = predicate of predicates

| I will now say a few words about what you have called Categories,
| but for which I prefer the designation Predicaments, and which you
| have explained as predicates of predicates. That wonderful operation
| of hypostatic abstraction by which we seem to create 'entia rationis'
| that are, nevertheless, sometimes real, furnishes us the means of
| turning predicates from being signs that we think or think 'through',
| into being subjects thought of. We thus think of the thought-sign
| itself, making it the object of another thought-sign. Thereupon,
| we can repeat the operation of hypostatic abstraction, and from
| these second intentions derive third intentions. Does this series
| proceed endlessly? I think not. What then are the characters of
| its different members? My thoughts on this subject are not yet
| harvested. I will only say that the subject concerns Logic, but
| that the divisions so obtained must not be confounded with the
| different Modes of Being:* Actuality, Possibility, Destiny
| (or Freedom from Destiny). On the contrary, the succession
| of Predicates of Predicates is different in the different
| Modes of Being. Meantime, it will be proper that in our
| system of diagrammatization we should provide for the
| division, whenever needed, of each of our three
| Universes of modes of reality into 'Realms'
| for the different Predicaments.
|
| C.S. Peirce, CP 4.549
|
| C.S. Peirce,
|"Prolegomena to an Apology for Pragmaticism",
|'The Monist', vol. 16 (1906), pp. 492-546.
|'Collected Papers', CP 4.530-572.

[edit] Subject

[edit] Predicate

| The view which pragmatic logic takes of the predicate, in consequence of
| its assuming that the entire purpose of deductive logic is to ascertain
| the necessary conditions of the truth of signs, without any regard to
| the accidents of Indo-European grammar, will be here briefly stated.
| Cf. Negation [CP 2.378-380].
|
| In any proposition, i.e., any statement which must be true or false,
| let some parts be struck out so that the remnant is not a proposition,
| but is such that it becomes a proposition when each blank is filled by
| a proper name. The erasures are not to be made in a mechanical way, but
| with such modifications as may be necessary to preserve the partial sense
| of the fragment. Such a residue is a 'predicate'. The same proposition
| may be mutilated in various ways so that different fragments will appear
| as predicates. Thus, take the proposition "Every man reveres some woman."
| This contains the following predicates, among others:
|
|  ". . . reveres some woman."
|
|  ". . . is either not a man or reveres some woman."
|
|  "Any previously selected man reveres . . ."
|
|  "Any previously selected man is . . ."
|
| C.S. Peirce, 'Collected Papers', CP 2.358, in dictionary entry for "Predicate",
| J.M. Baldwin (ed.), 'Dictionary of Philosophy & Psychology', vol. 2, pp. 325-326.

[edit] Continuous predicate

| When we have analyzed a proposition so as to throw into the subject everything
| that can be removed from the predicate, all that it remains for the predicate to
| represent is the form of connection between the different subjects as expressed in
| the propositional 'form'. What I mean by "everything that can be removed from the
| predicate" is best explained by giving an example of something not so removable.
| But first take something removable. "Cain kills Abel." Here the predicate
| appears as "--- kills ---." But we can remove killing from the predicate
| and make the latter "--- stands in the relation --- to ---." Suppose we
| attempt to remove more from the predicate and put the last into the form
| "--- exercises the function of relate of the relation --- to ---" and then
| putting "the function of relate to the relation" into a another subject leave
| as predicate "--- exercises --- in respect to --- to ---." But this "exercises"
| expresses "exercises the function". Nay more, it expresses "exercises the function
| of relate", so that we find that though we may put this into a separate subject, it
| continues in the predicate just the same. Stating this in another form, to say that
| "A is in the relation R to B" is to say that A is in a certain relation to R. Let
| us separate this out thus: "A is in the relation R^1 (where R^1 is the relation
| of a relate to the relation of which it is the relate) to R to B". But A is
| here said to be in a certain relation to the relation R^1. So that we can
| expresss the same fact by saying, "A is in the relation R^1 to the relation
| R^1 to the relation R to B", and so on 'ad infinitum'. A predicate which
| can thus be analyzed into parts all homogeneous with the whole I call
| a 'continuous predicate'. It is very important in logical analysis,
| because a continuous predicate obviously cannot be a 'compound'
| except of continuous predicates, and thus when we have carried
| analysis so far as to leave only a continuous predicate, we
| have carried it to its ultimate elements.
|
| Peirce, "Letters to Lady Welby", 14 Dec 1908, 'Selected Writings', pp. 396-397.
|
| Charles S. Peirce, "Letters to Lady Welby", pp. 380-432 in:
|'Charles S. Peirce: Selected Writings (Values in a Universe
| of Chance)', Edited with an Introduction and Notes by
| Philip P. Wiener, Dover, New York, NY, 1966.

[edit] Relative of second intention

[edit] My Prescious ...

Given the overweaning (sic) influence of nominal thinking -- thinking in name only -- in the century so thankfully just overcome, Peirce's use of not just one, but two brands of abstraction, hypostatic abstraction and prescisive abstraction, is one of the most difficult duos in his entire corpus to which to do justice. Aside from which he spells the word I spelled as "prescisive" in more different ways than any other of which I know, as if the waters weren't muddy enough already. The link between "precise" and "prescind" no doubt lies deep in etymology, but most folks nowadays seem to take it as a confusing pun, so I've tried to settle on a reasonable compromise in this respect. Jon Awbrey 20:18, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Historical Layering

The reason that I'm finding myself forced to fuss over the citations so much -- and believe me it's not the sort of thing that I'd do for fun -- is that it's so necessary in reading Peirce to keep in mind when and where he wrote each given statement. This is not because of the issue that gets so badly-mintoned about the Peirce net -- whether the development of Peirce's architectonic plating is catastrophic or gradualist -- but simply because it's necessary to follow arguments that take place over decades, and that get played out for audiences of wildly diverse "receiver operating characteristics". So the style sheets that we use for research journals, where the second most important datum is the freshness date of the latest edition, plays havoc here, where we need to be constantly reminded in continuous context of when and where a given keg of ideas was originally broached. I know of some style sheets that use a very complex historical layering, with multiply nested sets of parentheses, but I'm trying to avoid going to that extreme, so it may take some fiddling yet to see what works here. Jon Awbrey 19:48, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Peirce and the Isms

JA: I see that there is a whole lot of gear gnashing about where to peg Peirce vis-a-vis the various isms, especially with respect to idealisms, nominalisms, and realisms of various flavors and stripes. I will just put it forward as something to think about that dichotomous thinking hardly ever cuts much ice with Peirce, and generally speaking when he does invoke an ism he adopts it as a heuristic angle on a contingent problem and does not espouse it as a declaration of absolute dogma. If one keeps that in mind and removes the dichotomous reticle from one's own mind's eye, then most of the false dilemmas and appearances of radical mind-alteration in Peirce's work will tend to evaporate. Jon Awbrey 05:30, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Break up article?

Is it me or is that article simply excessively long ...? I think it would make sense to introduce a series of articles like Peirce's semiotics, Peirce's X, Peirce's Y and only leave brief summaries in the Peirce article. This should make the main article much easier to navigate and digest, at the same time providing more flexibility and scalability to the whole thing. (Anonymous Coward) 15:24, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

  • JA: No, AC, it's just you. Seriously now, if you take some time to read the article and the discussion page, you will see that a de-monopolization is already well in hand, but some of the divestitures required the expansion of the more wholly-onerous subsidiaries, and there is only so much time in the day. So watch this space and stay tomed. Jon Awbrey 15:39, 23 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Relations in Peirce

  • JA: Well, folks, I just wasted a month of my life rewriting the article on relations in mathematics in a way that I thought might eventually be of service to readers of Peirce, only to have every bit, byte, and tilde regressed back to the wholly inaccessible shape that it was in before I started. So it looks like I will just have to try and write a separate article that might be of uberty and utility in this aim. Stay tomed. Jon Awbrey 21:08, 25 January 2006 (UTC)
  • JA: The article on relations in mathematics seems to have settled down to a shape that is satisfactory to the mathematical "community of special interest" (COSI), but I don't know if it would serve the needs of the Peirce and semiotics COSI's yet. So I would be very interested in some feedback on that score, either here or better on the talk page for that article, as I feel like a lone voice in the mathematical wilderness there. I also have 3 or 4 other articles in the works that may fill in the gaps and develop the subject in ways that are pertinent to Peirce, but they are definitely not ready for prime time yet. Jon Awbrey 10:58, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The New York Nation

The evidence I can find suggests that the reference to this periodical and to its editor William Lloyd Garrison should really refer to The Nation and its editor Wendell Phillips Garrison, the son of WLG. Anyone know where the current statement came from? Colonies Chris 09:32, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

  • JA: Sorry, been busy. I didn't write the bio sections, but if it's sourced at all I'm guessing Brent. Will check later today when it doesn't disturb the sleepers of the house to go rummaging through the library. Jon Awbrey 10:38, 30 January 2006 (UTC)
  • JA: Yes, I think you are right, as WLG is mentioned on p. 28 of Brent in connection with events prior to CSP's birth. His "long and demanding friendship" with WPG is mentioned on p. 213. Jon Awbrey 14:50, 30 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Citation Issues

Here are some of the principles that I would like to observe in matters of citation, references, bibliography, and so on.

  • The most important principles are that the reader be able: (1) to acquire complete and correct bibliographic information (2) as quickly as possible, (3) without having to guess, and (4) in a way that is "robust against information loss" (RAIL), in particular, that preserves the history of the works cited.
  • The definitive source of bibliographic data is the title page of the article or book in question.
  • Now that search engine visibility is a far more important consideration than conserving bits and bytes, or ink and paper, some of the older practices of abbreviation and compression are no longer necessary, indeed, in many cases they have become a positive obstacle to the quick access of information, and so it is appropriate to modify them.
  • More incidentally, the distinction between "works actually cited in the text" and a selected bibliography of a particular author, field, or topic needs to be recogized one way or another.
  • It's also nice if the citation style is clean and logical, with a minimum of nonsense, specialized uses of punctuations, excessive nesting of parentheses, and so on.

I'd much rather be adding article content than fussing over these issues, but I am tiring of having to correct uninformed changes by anonymous users, so I have set these principles forth as a basis for discussion. Jon Awbrey 15:00, 1 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Hyperlinking

I changed the target of "How to Make our Ideas Clear" to the WikiSource page. I assumed this was a good idea ... feel free to correct or change it, but please tell me on my talk page why you did because I need to improve my understanding of Wikipedia conventions. Leon... 23:46, 1 February 2006 (UTC)

  • JA: Just on first impression, the copies of Peirce's papers at WikiSource are inferior to the ones at Arisbe and Peirce.Org. I will leave the substitution a while on a trial basis, and look at it again tomorrow. Jon Awbrey 03:30, 2 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Charles Peirce (Bibliography)

  • JA: By way of guides to good style, I've been looking to the way that other inciters of complex literatures are handled, say, Aristotle or Chaucer. This has led me to begin spinning off separate articles for each of Peirce's major works, and also to create a separate Charles Peirce (Bibliography) page, so as to avoid reduplicating standard references to primary and secondary literatures in excruciating detail within each separate article. Jon Awbrey 14:42, 5 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] On re*invention

  • JA: To say that X reinvented Y, as in X reinvented the wheel, is commonly taken to imply a number of things that are somewhat pejorative of X. It suggests: (1) that X is claiming as an original invention something that somebody else already invented, perhaps a long time ago, (2) that X is claiming as an original invention some idea that was already "in the air" and that most or many people were already familiar with, (3) that X, for lack of scholarship, availability of sources, or desire to know, fails to recognize the derivative nature of X's claimed invention, (4) that X fails to give due credit to X's sources. It is unsourced speculation in some respects and just plain false statement in other repects to attribute these characters to GSB's work in regard to CSP's work. Jon Awbrey 16:36, 14 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] NB: There is a No Original Research policy

I believe that this entry, as it now stands, is in possible violation of the following policy:

Wikipedia:No original research

I learned of this policy only very recently.

Mid-2005, Charles Peirce was in poor shape. The problem is part of a wider one; I fully agree with Larry Sanger when he argues that Wikipedia entries on academic philosophy leave a good deal to be desired, when held up to the standard set by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Sad to say, the Peirce entry was deficient even though it was mostly written by a credentialed academic, Jaime Nubiola, a leading Spanish Peircian; for starters, his command of English left something to be desired. I proceeded to edit the erratic English of the entire article, and to rewrite the sections on Peirce's life and writings (for the record, the source for much of what I did was Brent's well-known biography). I put out a call on Talk: Peirce for persons with academic expertise on Peirce to contribute summaries of his ideas.

Sometime in December 2005, a certain Jon Awbrey began making major additions and reorganizations of this entry. While I value much of his organizing work, I have serious reservations about the content of those edits, namely that that content violates the No Original Research policy. Awbrey seemed like an answer to my prayers--except that, as far as I can determine, he is no expert. The only peer-reviewed work Awbrey cites by himself is an article by himself and a Susan Awbrey, published in a journal I have never seen cited in another context. Google turns up nothing about Jon Awbrey. He has revealed that the material he has added to the Peirce entry is largely taken from a Ph.D. thesis he submitted about 10 years ago to a computer and information science department. But nowhere does he cite that thesis, much less any publications based thereon. I tentatively conclude that Awbrey's thesis was not accepted. A failed thesis is emphatically not an acceptable source.

Mind you, even if Awbrey were to cite a completed thesis, I would not be satisfied, because that thesis would have been on the history of ideas but screened by computer scientists, a human community whose members are seldom Peirce experts. I have asked Awbrey to base his edits on the Peirce secondary literature. His reply was to assert that one word by Peirce himself is worth a 1000 words cited from the secondary literature. At the time I was ignorant of the No Original Research policy, and I very much suspect that Awbrey was as well. Awbrey indeed does cite Peirce liberally, and sometimes to good effect, but the resulting narrative style, while appropriate for original research taking the form of a thesis or scholarly journal, is not appropriate for an encyclopedia article.

This is not a storm in a teapot; Peirce is now widely seen as the greatest American abstract thinker, and his work makes up a major challenge to historians of ideas. Hence summarizing his ideas is not a straightforward matter. Merely jotting down what can be found by leafing through 2-3 books available in any university library will not do the job. Even though he died in 1914 and a large amount of his work was published 1931-35, a fair amount of the primary literature has been published only since 1975, and a great deal of his writings has yet to be published. His manuscripts were catalogued only in 1971. The secondary literature on Peirce is only a half-century old and is still struggling towards consensus. All in all, coming to terms with Peirce is the second hardest editorial job I know of, exceeded only by the Leibniz corpus. As matters now stand, no academic authority on Peirce will take the trouble to edit or add to the Peirce entry, because whatever they add has to rub shoulders with Jon Awbrey's idiosyncratic perspective.

Needless to say, I think that granting this entry "Good article" status was a mistake; to make it a Featured article would only compound the error.Concerned cynic 16:07, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

  • JA: I have read the WP:NOR policy over very carefully several times, have followed a number of discussions on its proper interpretation, and find myself in agreement with it, as it is simply the requirement that statements made in the text of an article should be grounded in external research, or clearly capable of being so grounded, in the case of statements not currently in doubt. The following quotation from the policy is helpful in understanding its scope and purpose:
Original research that creates primary sources is not allowed.
However, research that consists of collecting and organizing
information from existing primary and/or secondary sources is
strongly encouraged. In fact, all articles on Wikipedia should
be based on information collected from primary and secondary
sources. This is not "original research", it is "source-based
research", and it is fundamental to writing an encyclopedia.
WP:NOR
  • JA: Notice that this policy does not say that all articles should be spliced together from existing works, as this would clearly violate other explicit policies.
  • JA: So it seems that the best way to follow this policy is to make sure that all statements are grounded in independently verifiable sources, and that any doubts about the evidence can be resolved simply by following the indices of source material. In the case of Peirce, in particular, the closer that we hew to the primary source, the more assured we'll be of betting on the right horse. Not A Pseudonym, Jon Awbrey 17:32, 15 February 2006 (UTC)
  • Wikipedia is not a product, it is a process. That is what confuses academics who don't understand the new paradigm. It makes no difference what degrees anyone has here, and that is evidently a thorn in the side of some who have worked so hard to achieve that piece of parchment. Mr Cynic is obviously unhappy with the Peirce article, and spent over 600 words telling us so. He grants that "coming to terms with Peirce is the second hardest editorial job I know of", but seems to be reticent to "rub shoulders" with other editors. Instant peer review can be daunting. If he doesn't wish to collaborate, that is regrettable, because we need editors who are knowledgeable and willing to work with others for the simple joy of organizing and disseminating knowledge. --Blainster 18:50, 15 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Article removed from Wikipedia:Good articles

This article was formerly listed as a good article, but was removed from the listing because some of the sections don't have any content, eg under 'Works'. Also I'd recommend not going so far as using sub-sub-subheadings as it makes the TOC look very overwhelming. Worldtraveller 01:01, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Problematic sentence

This sentence from the article "Next one proceeds to 'crank the formula', starting from a form that is true but problematically obscure in its implications, and, circumstances warranting, continuing until a logically equivalent or a lower implied form is reached, but one that is maximally clarified in its implications." is indecipherable. Partly because its too long; But mainly because it used terms that are unexplained. What is a "form" and how can a form be true? What does it mean to call a form problematically obscure" The verb "continuing" makes no sense because we haven't been told what were doing yet, so its means nothing to say that we should continue doing it. What is a "lower implied form" and how is "reached"? What sorts of implications can forms have? I'm going to delete the sentence if someone doesn't rewrite so that it actually says something. --Epistemologist 12:13, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: I'll work on it. Editors on the Peirce page often get requests to relate the more abstruse matters that Peirce routinely contemplated to more everyday, familiar, and sublunary subjects. The paragraph in question looks like one of those attempts. They hardly ever succeed on the first dozen trials or so, if ever. Jon Awbrey 15:26, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Reverted edits

JA: I will put the suggested concision here, and work on splitting the difference, as there's such a thing as being too telegraphic. Jon Awbrey 04:28, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Peirce's use of phrases like the "laws of the symbol" echo themes that were already common. There was, among other influences, the symbolist movement, inspired by the ideas of George Peacock (1791–1858), and there was, most prominently, the work of George Boole.

Some themes of the symbolist movement are familiar to anyone who has worked a mathematical "story problem," a roughly realistic representation of a concrete situation. The goal is to abstract a general formula from the details of the problem, and to discern which details are only irrelevant distractions. The next step is to derive the implications of the formula, by substituting specific values for some of its variables while leaving other variables unset. But progressive clarification of the formula leads to an equivalent or implied formula that amounts to an abstract answer or a generic solution to the problem. Finally, on can fill in the rest of the concrete data to arrive at the concrete answer to the problem.

The three-phase maneuver for solving a story problem, (1) teasing out, (2) cranking the crank, (3) plugging in, can be articulated in semiotic or sign-relational terms as follows: The first phase passes from the object domain to the sign domain, the second phase passes from the sign domain to the interpretant sign domain, continuing perhaps in a relay of successive passes, and the third phase passes from the last interpretant sign domain back to the object domain.

[edit] This article needs plainer writing

I tried to read this article to learn something about Mr. Peirce philosophy, but I couldn't get through it. I'm a philosophy major and get As in logic. So I do not think I'm stupid. I can understand a lot of hard stuff. The biography part of this article is ok. But the description of his philosophy is very hard to understand thhe way it is written. You need to stop frequently and give an example of what you are talking about. The part about the story problem is an example of what I mean. The article never says it what is. Is the same as what we called a word problem in grade school arithmetic? Give example of this story problem. Show yourself solveing it using the 3 steps. Thank you. --LogicMan 06:28, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for saying that. I agree. I teach philosophy and I know something about Peirce and even I had to read parts of this multiple times to understand. I think I now know what its trying to say in every passage, but it is written so abstractly and is so wordy I can see that someone who didn't already understand Peirce would not understand a lot of this article. Which raises the interesting question of who the wikipedia for? Is there someplace where the intended audience is described. Maybe I should start there before I try to contribute again. By the way, I think a story problem is the same thing as a word problem. --AnnMBake 06:41, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Valuable comments. Let's hope that the author(s) can take them into account. Banno 11:34, 8 June 2006 (UTC)
From the discussion below, apparently not. Banno 22:49, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: I think that WP is written for people who want to become better informed about the subjects that they inquire into than they were when they started. Clarity is a virtue toward this end. It's good to make the writing plainer and simpler just so long as you don't make it wronger in the process. Many parts of Peirce's philosophy are as technical in nature as anything you'll find in WP articles on logic, math, and the sciences. Other parts of his work draw on sources in classical and scholastic philosophies that many later philosophers all but ignored, and thus there are many unfamiliar themes and terms-of-art that seem original with Peirce only on account of our modern, er, selectiveness of attention. This type of technical writing is a very trying task no matter where you try to do it — it takes many trials and involves many tribulations. Very often you find that you didn't know as much as you thought you did, and you have to go off and do some more reading before you can continue with the writing. So it's best not to expect a quick and easy rhetorical fix for every problem of exposition that comes along. Feedback from readers is much appreciated, and can help to bring a sleepy old article like this one a new lease on life, but it helps best if it points to specific problem areas where something is less clear than it might be. And please be conscious of the (DIYD)2 tendency in criticism, when critics demand that a piece of text be shorter and more detailed at one and the same time. A straint like that "teaches old hearts to break". Jon Awbrey 13:02, 8 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, I've done some poking around Wikipedia's descriptive pages and, surprisingly, I can find nothing that explicitly addresses the question of who the encyclopedia is for. But there is a lot of talk about using Wikipedia in schools which would suggest it is intended for students. No one below the college level is going to be reading up on Peirce, so I do not think we must write for high schoolers; but the article ought to be understandable to college students. At present it is not. I think your first sentence is true, Jon Awbrey, but it is just a truism isn't it? After all, everyone wants to know more than they did when they started, so your formulation doesn't narrow down the intended audience at all. Also, LogicMan and I did "point to specific problem areas where something is less clear than it might be" (or as I would put it "point to a particular unclear passage".) And the passage that LogicMan was referring to is not about some technical area of Peirce. Its about arithmetic word problems, something every schoolchild understands and yet this passage makes it unrecognizable. I'm going to try (again) to rewrite it soon and add the example LogicMan requested. --AnnMBake 03:25, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

A point I forgot to mention above: I think I've figured out one additional reason why this article is so difficult to understand, besides its being too wordy. It is has a lot of allusions to things instead of just stating things. The trouble with allusions is that their meaning can only be grasped by someone who already knows the matter being alluded to. Which means allusions never really inform anybody. So they have no place in an encyclopedia. For example, it says this "Peirce did not live or work in a vacuum. No one who appreciates his use of phrases like 'laws of the symbol' in their historical context can fail to hear the echoes of George Boole, nor the undertones of the symbolist movement in mathematics that was inspired by the ideas of George Peacock." Putting aside the fact that the first sentence is an empty truism (and a cliche), the next sentence aludes to things that a typical college level reader will know nothing about: the ideas of Boole and Peacock on symbolism. What the article should do is simply state something like "Peirce's ideas on symbols were influenced by Boole and Peacock." --AnnMBake 03:41, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Thank you AnnMBake. --LogicMan 03:44, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: One of the things that I used to do for a living was statistical consulting, a big part of which was survey research, in particular, needs assessment surveys. I often hear speculations about "the needs of our audience", but I have yet to see any data, hard or soft, or the slightest attempt to gather any. This would be regarded as a very curious observation in any organization that affected to be concerned with "the needs of its audience", and so I have to speculate that most folks hereabouts really prefer to keep that old standby, the "silent majority argument" — in this case, the "Argumentum Ad WikiPopulum" — in the bag for those occasions when they can't figure any other way to get a god on their side. In short, that sort of argument appears to be what psychologists call a "projection", and it's always best to have a blank screen for the medium thereof.

JA: Yes, it's a truism that everybody "says" that they want to know more. In my experience, however, the spirit asserts its willingness while the flesh denies its weakness. In practice, most folks find it far more to their liking to reduce the subject matter to what they already know than they find it worth their trouble to learn a single whit more. Sad, perhaps, but empirically true.

JA: The illustrative example of the story problem is not the main subject here, but was an expository attempt to relate a very difficult topic in Peirce's philosophy to what should have been a very familiar and simple example. It now seems that the illustration is proving more of a detour to some people than a ramp up to the expressway, so I think I will have to re-think it altogether. Jon Awbrey 04:12, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

I have a better idea. Why not let me rethink it? Or at any rate, someone other than you? Why don't you let someone else's writing stay as it is for more than a couple of hours? If other people had been able to see it, they might have preferred my earlier editing of that passage. --AnnMBake 04:41, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: Think away. Edit away. Everything's negotiable. But negotiation is not so much a 2-way street as it is a Piccadilly Circus, and if somebody finds your edits off-base, they will re-edit them. And so it goes. I read your edits, I duly considered them, I even copied them here for further consideration. But in my judgment, they missed the whole point of what the example was intended to do at that point in text. Jon Awbrey 05:02, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

Ann is a new user. Let her do some editing. We don't want to drive away our contributors. Despite your claims, you are not being collaborative. You are not free to summarily revert others edits with no good reason. "I like my way better" is not a reason, and it won't fly on Wikipedia. This project works by consensus, and you have not established one. If you saw some appropriate modifications, then fine, but reversions should be limited to vandalism or group consensus edits. Please try harder to work with the other editors. The ones who have commented here are correct. The present article needs considerable improvement in its clarity. Wikipedia articles should not read like a journal. They are targeted at the general educated reader. --Blainster 19:36, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: There is known bug in that section, the fact that it begins with two long quotations, one from Boole and one from Peirce. The fact is that I simply got waylaid by other tasks in writing this and other articles, and haven't gotten back to writing the intended intros and segues. At any rate, the part that follows is intended for the reader who did read those quotes, and it remarks on the fact that Peirce is using a phrase that was "in the air" at the time. Now, a reader who doesn't know a lot of the Peirce literature and associated discussion may think that a statement like "Peirce did not live or work in a vacuum" is a truistic cliche, but the fact is that it doesn't "go without saying" precisely because it is needed to counter very common misconceptions about Peirce that are prevalent both in and out of Peirceana. Actually, the original version said "Despite what you hear, Peirce did not live or work in a vacuum", but a subsequent editor thought that the first part was "unencyclopedic". Style is more important that substance, y'know. Jon Awbrey 04:32, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: Blainster, I am wounded by your charges of non-collaboration. The edit history will show that I was in fact already working on revising that section in response to previous criticism from Epistemologist when Ann intervened. I copied her edits to talk and took her requests for further concision into serious consideration with the work that I was doing on that section. Jon Awbrey 21:48, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

You reveal more about your psychology and your attitude to Wikipedia than you realize in your answer to Blainster. You think of editing Wikipedia as a process that you are executing. Other people's edits are "interventions" in your process. You think that reverting is ok if you copy the other version to a talk page and declare that you are "considering" it in conjunction "with the work that I was doing." And you assume that your version of any passage is the one that must be used while the passage is in dispute. --LogicMan 23:37, 10 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: Thank you for your speculations on my psychological makeup. I always find the "getting to know you" phases of meeting new acquaintances extremely stimulating. When we have all gotten to know each other a little better then maybe we'll be able to focus a little less distractedly on the ever more fascinating subject of this article. And much as I enjoy the intervening interludes, I do look forward to that, too. Jon Awbrey 02:26, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Deleted Material: Scholastic Realism

It is clear from above that there is a concensus that this article is pitched to journal level and not general educated audience as it should be. For that reason and others, I'm moving the Sholastic realism section to here (for consideration ;-) ). Besides the fact that most of it is taken up with an interpretation dispute among scholars (and it takes sides in that dispute), the first sentence calls "well known" something readers will have never heard of and the second sentence is obviously POV. The second sentence also assumes wrongly that one who believes that reality depends on many minds instead of one is not an idealist. The part beginning "Third" is weird because if Peirce's doctrine is not about realism vs. idealism, then why did this very paragraph start out talking about realism vs. idealism? Why not leave the latter topic out of this section entirely instead of putting it in and suddenly saying well Peirce is not really talking about that anyway. --Wylie Ali 01:49, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

Here it is:

Peirce’s confession to being a “scholastic realist of a somewhat extreme stripe” (CP 5.470) is well known and baffles some. He has been described by careless writers as an idealist (“reality” = “the object of the final opinion of the scientific community”), but this description is inaccurate, since he believed that reality was best described as independent of mind, at least of minds in particular, if not necessarily of minds in general. The problem of interpretation appears to arise from at least three sources. First, Peirce's use of the word "independent" needs to be understood in a way that is analogous to its definition in mathematics, where it means "orthogonal", or its definition in statistics, where it means "uncorrelated". In these senses, independence is a particular kind of relation, not a lack of relation, and certainly not a form of disconnection or exclusion. Second, Peirce did in fact describe himself as being in favor of objective idealism, but what he meant by that is a far cry from ordinary idealism. Third, we need to recognize that scholastic realism is one side of the realist vs. nominalist debate over universals, and not a position in the realist vs. idealist debate about a mind-independent reality. Peirce’s scholastic realism in fact supplies essential support for his own thesis of objective idealism regarding the relationship between matter and mind. Two early studies on Peirce’s realism and the influence of Duns Scotus thereon, are the chapter by McKeon in Wiener and Young (1952), and that by Moore in Moore and Robin (1964).

In his first remarks on the realist vs. nominalist debate, Peirce sided with nominalism:

Qualities are fictions; for though it is true that roses are red, yet redness is nothing, but a fiction framed for the purpose of philosophizing; yet harmless so long as we remember that the scholastic realism it implies is false. (CE 1, 307, 1865).

Here Peirce is explicitly disparaging a position he is well-known for spending most of his life defending. How might we make sense of this apparent contradiction? The temptation is to simply say Peirce changed his mind. After all, since Peirce asserts nominalism in 1865 and scholastic realism in 1868, Peirce may have gone from denying the reality of universals to asserting it. This explanation is most famously given by Max Fisch in his “Peirce’s Progress from Nominalism toward Realism” (1967) and then again in his introduction to volume two of the Chronological Edition of Peirce’s writings (1984). However, recently this way of understanding Peirce has been indepenently challenged by Rosa Mayorga in her On Universals (2002) and by Robert Lane in his “Peirce’s Early Realism” (2004). Both Mayorga and Lane are troubled by several instances where Peirce’s self assessment of his own intellectual development contradicts Fisch's account of Peirce development. One of these statemesnts appears in 1893 when Peirce states that “never, during the thirty years in which I have been writing on philosophical questions, have I failed in my allegiance to realistic opinions and to certain Scotistic ideas.” (6.605, italics mine) Remarks like these led Lane to conduct a re-evaluation of Peirce’s 1865 declarations for nomianlism, whereupon Lane discovered significant evidence for the same conclusion Mayorga had already reached two years earlier (unbenownst to Lane). Both concluded that the correct way to understand Peirce’s shift from outspoken nominalist to outspoken realist is not by reading into Peirce a change in his fundamental philosophical position, but instead to realize that Peirce merely changed his understanding and use of the terms “scholastic realism” and “nominalism”. The reason Peirce calls himself a nominalist in 1865 is because he believes realism to only come in the form offered by Plato:

It has been said that these “abstract names” [blueness, hardness, and loudness] denote qualities and connote nothing. But it seems to me the phrase “denoted object” is nothing but a roundabout expression for a thing…. To say that a quality is denoted is to say it is a thing…. [Such terms] were framed at a time when all men were realists in the scholastic sense and consequently things were meant by them, entities which had no quality but that expressed by the word. They, therefore, must denote these things and connote the qualities they relate to. (Peirce, CE 1, 311-312).

When Peirce goes on to call universals “fictions,” he is not condemning their truth; he is simply asserting that they do not exist as particulars. This becomes clearer when in the same paper Peirce argues against psychologism in logic, by establishing the same “fictional” status for logic and mathematics that he claims for universals. Now by proving logic “fictional,” Peirce believes he does logic a favor, i.e., by saving it from the psychologists. This suggests that Peirce employed “fictional” in a rather idiosyncratic way. Many things (including universals) covered by Peirce’s pre-1868 use of “fictional” came under his post-1868 use of "real". Peirce had been using “fictional” to refer to things having no physical existence, and not to imply that something was merely the result of human imagination or fancy. By 1868 at least, Peirce had changed his mind about "reality", holding instead that "fictional" should be contrasted with "independent of what we think about it" (real). He no longer deemed existence as a physical object as a prerequisite for being real, so that a lack of physical existence no longer led Peirce to chatacterize universals as "fictional." That something has blueness can be true independent of what anyone thinks of it, and therefore it can be a part of reality despite the fact blueness never has a physical existence anywhere. Blueness is real (independent of what anyone thinks), but it does not exist (as an entity; it has no secondness).

[edit] Removed Fisch quote

This quote is being removed because it is just one expert scoring a point off of others. The point it makes is made just below it more briefly anyway.

It is not sufficiently recognized that Peirce’s career was that of a scientist, not a philosopher; and that during his lifetime he was known and valued chiefly as a scientist, only secondly as a logician, and scarcely at all as a philosopher. Even his work in philosophy and logic will not be understood until this fact becomes a standing premise of Peircian studies. (Max Fisch, in (Moore and Robin 1964, 486).

--LogicMan 15:16, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removing intro to Formal perspective

I am going to remove the whole of the intro to the Formal perspective section for these reasons:

It begins with two long (and too long ;-) ) quotations that won't be understandable to the audience of generally educated. Also, we are writing a secondary source, so it is our job to interpret and paraphrase so that the reader doesn't have to decode original material.
The rest of it is original research about a "crisis" and the "life cycle" of a "symbolist perspective" that is not about Peirce. Looks like somebody has a thesis about symbolism, but they should submit it to a journal; not put it here.
It suffers from the same writing problems mentioned above.

I am not going to copy it here, since you can get it in the history. --Wylie Ali 16:08, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removing 2 more long quotes

I am removing the two long quotes from the Logic as semiotic section, for the reasons given above. Also, the first quote is from Peirce tnat is nearly indicipherable even to an expert reader. The second is Putnam making a minor point on the use of Peirce's notation by others. Bits of material before and after the quotes which refers to them goes too. --Wylie Ali 16:24, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removing inappropriate material

I am going to remove the following from the Logic as semiotic section:

On how the young Bertrand Russell, especially his Principles of Mathematics and Principia Mathematica, did not do Peirce justice, see Anellis (1995).
Peirce's work on formal logic had admirers other than Ernst Schröder:
The philosophical algebraist William Kingdon Clifford and the logician William Ernest Johnson, both British;
The Polish school of logic and foundational mathematics, including Alfred Tarski;
Arthur Prior, whose Formal Logic and chapter in Moore and Robin (1964) praised and studied Peirce's logical work.

The first sentence is an allusion to a complaint about Russell that is not explained. General educated readers won't know what it is talking about. The rest is just a list of people who were influenced by Peirce. All of them are likely to be completely unknown to readers. --Wylie Ali 16:40, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The Relationships and relatives stuff should go

It seems to me that all of the stuff on relationships and relatives at least up to the section "Theory of categories" is way too advanced for a generally educated reader. It is also unmotivated. We are told that a reader of Peirce must understand how Peirce used these terms, but we are not told why. Finally, it is unsourced original research. There's a reference to a Peirce article in Monist, but it is detached from any particular sentence. At any rate, this is obviously somebody's original interpretation of Peircean thoughts about relations. (If I'm wrong about that, then references to the secondary sources where these interpretations come from should be added.) But I'm going to wait to see if there is a concensus among others that it should be removed. Would everyone please give me an opinion yay or nay on removing this? --Wylie Ali 16:56, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I vote to delete it. --LogicMan 16:59, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
Delete for the reasons Wylie Ali gives. --AnnMBake 19:02, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
Me too. --MengTheMagnificent 08:08, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] sockpuppet issue

Uh... sockpuppet alert. All four users above were created within the last five days. Taking a look at their contributions, they all seem to have quite similar interests (notably this article and, ironically, Truth). FranksValli 14:39, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
Interesting. Can an administrator please verify the IP address(es) from which these usernames were posted? This development, if true, would change a recent "vote" about an aspect of truth from 6-2 to 3-2, among other things. ... Kenosis 16:00, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
What's a sockpuppet alert? --LogicMan 16:58, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
See WP:SOCK. - CobaltBlueTony 17:24, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
I don't have any sockpuppets. I have talked up The Wikipedia to others lately. --LogicMan 17:55, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
OK. I've read the link about sockpuppets, but I do not get FranksValli's inference. Surely the usual way that people learn of Wikipedia is that friends or colleagues with common interests tell them about it. It would be expected that bunches of people with common interests would all join up around the same time. Am I missing something? For what its worth I told two colleagues about my experiences here last week. I know one of them was planning to join up and I'm 99% sure that another did or will too. Does this help? --AnnMBake 20:17, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
Hi Ann, apologies then if these are actual people and not the same person on different names. I agree that it's common for people to hear of Wikipedia through their friends or colleagues. Unfortunately, it's equally common for people to create multiple usernames for the sole purpose of falsifying voting on editing disputes. I found the voting suspicious because Charles Peirce hasn't been a high traffic page, and thus it's unusual to receive so many votes, all from new users, in such a short amount of time. Anyhow, this being said, it's great that this page is now getting more attention, and I'm sure you all will greatly improve the page with your knowledge! I can't really help myself, since I know next to nothing about Peirce.. hopefully this article will expand on my knowledge. FranksValli 00:39, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
Thank you for being so gracious. I was beginning to think that was in short supply on wikipedia. Since I think I might be an unintentional "meat puppet", I think that I'm going to colleagues that I think might be among the above 4 that we take a break from wikipedia or at least from the Truth and Peirce articles for a while. I do not want people to think that we are ganging up. But I think the concensus decision above is still valid since users Banno and Blainster expressed similiar sentiments. --AnnMBake 01:56, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

There certainly are no rules against collaboration. Given AnnMBake's level of insight and obvious wish to write for what's been aptly termed "generally educated" readers, it has been a breath of fresh air; in my personal estimation, a valuable contribution to the mix. Would've been deeply disappointed if they all came from the same IP address. Welcome to you. ... Kenosis 02:06, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Last week I couldn't even spell "CONCENSUS", and today I are one

[edit] The Problem of the One and the Many

JA: An Exercise in Abductive Reasoning for Peirce buffs:

Phenomena (that's Greek for "Appearances", as in "Can Be Deceiving").

[Context] JA: IMWBO (in my worker-bee opinion), Nathan Ladd's conduct in his recent sorties of drive-by shoutings is just plain vandalism, and should be reverted until he learns to respect the admittedly hard-won consensus process that had until lately resulted in a steadily improving article. The constant "I read a book (Kirkham 1992) on truth once" attitude, on top of the overall ignoratio with regard to the most basic elements of the subject matter and the general campaign of disinformation, has turned the article into a mass of sophomoric confusions that is no longer of any service to the unsuspecting reader. Jon Awbrey 23:58, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

[Response] I wish I could say I'm surprised that you resort entirely to name-calling and have not once given a rational argument to justify disagreement with any of my edits. Those who have done that in the years I've been on wiki will tell you I'm often convinced by rational argument. But I'm never intimidated by bullies, which is what you are. You're going to have to include me in your "concensus" like it or not. --Nate Ladd 00:33, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

Concensus changes

I think there's a misunderstanding by some editors of this page about the role of concensus. Prior to the recent activity of Kenosis and Jon Awbrey, the article had changed little in a long time. That's because it embodied a concensus of those who were watching it. JA and K were right to make changes where they thought they could improve on it. It would have been wrong for anyone to stop them on the grounds that they were changing something that had consensus agreement (even though that is exactly what they were doing). By the same token, no one now can reject a change merely on the grounds that it changes a preceding concensus. Particular reasons have to be given for and against each change in terms of what's good for the article. It is a hallmark of Wiki that no decision is ever final. Concensus isn't something that is reached once on wiki and then left unchanged. Concensus has to be re-reached on an almmost daily basis as new editors become active and old ones move away. --Nate Ladd 19:28, 5 June 2006 (UTC)

It is clear from above that there is a concensus that this article is pitched to journal level and not general educated audience as it should be. For that reason and others, I'm moving the Sholastic realism section to here (for consideration ;-) ). Besides the fact that most of it is taken up with an interpretation dispute among scholars (and it takes sides in that dispute), the first sentence calls "well known" something readers will have never heard of and the second sentence is obviously POV. The second sentence also assumes wrongly that one who believes that reality depends on many minds instead of one is not an idealist. The part beginning "Third" is weird because if Peirce's doctrine is not about realism vs. idealism, then why did this very paragraph start out talking about realism vs. idealism? Why not leave the latter topic out of this section entirely instead of putting it in and suddenly saying well Peirce is not really talking about that anyway. --Wylie Ali 01:49, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me that all of the stuff on relationships and relatives at least up to the section "Theory of categories" is way too advanced for a generally educated reader. It is also unmotivated. We are told that a reader of Peirce must understand how Peirce used these terms, but we are not told why. Finally, it is unsourced original research. There's a reference to a Peirce article in Monist, but it is detached from any particular sentence. At any rate, this is obviously somebody's original interpretation of Peircean thoughts about relations. (If I'm wrong about that, then references to the secondary sources where these interpretations come from should be added.) But I'm going to wait to see if there is a concensus among others that it should be removed. Would everyone please give me an opinion yay or nay on removing this? --Wylie Ali 16:56, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

I vote to delete it. --LogicMan 16:59, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
Delete for the reasons Wylie Ali gives. --AnnMBake 19:02, 11 June 2006 (UTC)
Me too. --MengTheMagnificent 08:08, 12 June 2006 (UTC)

Thank you for being so gracious. I was beginning to think that was in short supply on wikipedia. Since I think I might be an unintentional "meat puppet", I think that I'm going to colleagues that I think might be among the above 4 that we take a break from wikipedia or at least from the Truth and Peirce articles for a while. I do not want people to think that we are ganging up. But I think the concensus decision above is still valid since users Banno and Blainster expressed similiar sentiments. --AnnMBake 01:56, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Up-to-the-Minute Con-Census Report

[edit] Anomalous Features Of Observed Phenomena (AFOOPs)

  • JA: So tell me, what were you doing on your second day as a brand spanking newbie in WikiPrimeryskool? Reporting other editors for 3RR violations on the Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/3RR? Yup, I know that's what I was doing. Insert <Ironicon> here \longrightarrow\longleftarrow. P.S. I know that I've always been a slow learner, but I've been here six months and I didn't even know that there was such a thing until the GeeInquistor pinned my theses to the ducking stool thereof. Jon Awbrey 03:04, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: More hints later, for those who haven't a clue yet. Jon Awbrey 17:20, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Abductive Hypotheses Offered By Way Of Explanation (AHOBWOEs)

Would someone please request administrative review of the IP addresses involved? Collaboration is one thing, conspiracy is (arguably) another, fraud is yet another. Let's get this straight rather than beating around the bush, OK? ... Kenosis 17:42, 13 June 2006 (UTC) RE: above post by AnnMBake:

"Thank you for being so gracious. I was beginning to think that was in short supply on wikipedia. Since I think I might be an unintentional "meat puppet", I think that I'm going to colleagues that I think might be among the above 4 that we take a break from wikipedia or at least from the Truth and Peirce articles for a while. I do not want people to think that we are ganging up. But I think the concensus decision above is still valid since users Banno and Blainster expressed similiar sentiments. --AnnMBake 01:56, 13 June 2006 (UTC)"

Bold emphasis mine. An interesting and statistically improbable coincidence. Anyone have any relevant data about the odds here?. ... Kenosis 17:58, 13 June 2006 (UTC)

Well, go'olll'lee gee. Take off one hat, put on another and now i'm the sherrif, put on another and I'm the genrral store clerk but that's just a disgise because when I put on my cape I'm really LogisticMan, put on another and I'm WylECoyte aka "Sancho" his faithful ally and friend, put on another and I'm a collige professer in drag. Heckuva place that intnernet. Gol' dang. ... Kenosis 18:10, 13 June 2006 (UTC) And all may be traced to my ancient dynastic roots where ancestors used the power of Poo to change their identity to hide their true magnificence from the commoners. ... Kenosis 19:12, 13 June 2006 (UTC)
Don't tell me. LogisticMan forgot to take the kryptonite out of the cape? And who disguised as Clark? and also as Lois?, and Jimmie? and Perry White too?, fights a never ending battle for truth? Nooo way. I - would - be - soooo - disillusioned. Tell me it ain't so... Kenosis 02:50, 14 June 2006 (UTC)
[Repeating my statement below in close proximity to these earlier "comments" or "parodies" immediately above] In seriousness, I suppose I would attach an emoticon of some kind to my last several comments, but I am not pleased about this situation no matter what the truth turns out to be. The evidence I see is disturbing, but I conintue to AGF with respect to all parties putatively involved in the current situation here. [See also the post in the section immediately below about the extreme improbability of these events occuring randomly, absent an explanation such as, for instance, sockpuppetry.] Good day all, or any. ... Kenosis 20:47, 18 June 2006 (UTC)

For the record, though I'm very much in favor of changes to the current article, I'm removing myself from this discussion and I'm unwatching this entire page. The level of unprofessionalism here (and in some cases, pure bizarreness) in comments from both sides is what makes Wikipedia inferior and ridiculed. Also for the record: I don't give a damn how anyone spells consensus, as long as it's clearly understood. FranksValli 03:48, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: I will have some comments at the appropriate time, and in the appropriate forum, not here, on the things that make WP really and truly subject to ridicule, and whether there is anything that we can do about it. But for the moment I'm still just collecting data that are pertinent to our ongoing exercise in abductive reasoning, so eminently on as a Peircean topic. And the question, of course, as FranksValli 1st tumbled to it, is not how any 1 spells consensus, but how many 1's spell it "concensus". Jon Awbrey 04:06, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Old-fashioned Spellers and Hidden Codes

Well apparently I'm the only person in the world who ever misspells "consensus" since it appears that doing so constitutes proof that the speller is none other than me, at least if User:Jon Awbrey and User:Kenosis are to be believed. The latter tells us that two writers misspelling this word is a "statistically improbable" occurrence. Don't hold your breath waiting for him to provide a source for that claim: he just made it up. In reality most lists of common misspellings include this one. For example, this web site (50 Common Spelling Errors): http://dissc.tees.ac.uk/Mistakes/Spelling/Test/word12.htm. And what kind of wikipedian would I be if I didn't note this one: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_common_misspellings_in_English. (You'll find plenty more if you Google concensus consensus spelling).

The Columbia Guide to Standard American English (1993) notes "Concensus is an obsolete variant spelling of consensus and is now considered a misspelling; avoid it." (See it online here: http://www.bartleby.com/68/53/1453.html) So apparently I'm not a bad speller, just an old-fashioned one. And I'm not the only one. If you Google "concensus" alone, you'll get 1,550,000 hits. If you Google "consensus" you'll get 162,000,000. So "consensus" is misspelled as "concensus" about 1 out of every 100 times its written. (I presume User:Jon Awbrey and User:Kenosis think I wrote all of those 1,550,000 pages.) Old-fashioned spellers are even more common on wiki article talk pages. The misspelling occurs on 3610 of those pages. The correct spelling is on 46822. So it is misspelled 1 out of every 13 times its written here.

For those who like "exercises in reasoning" here's another. An excerpt from a FAQ put out by the computer services dept. of my employer:

Why do Internet voting sites always tell me I have already voted when I know I have not?
When news shows or reality shows invite watchers to vote online, they often try to prevent people from voting more than once. When a vote is cast, the voting site also records a hidden code that it receives from the computer used to vote. If someone attempts to vote later from that same computer, the voting site sees the same code and does not allow the second vote. When you access the Internet through the [name of college removed] terminals or computers, your connection passes through a gateway computer that always sends the same code. The first [name of college removed] network user who attempts to vote will be allowed to. If other users whose connection passes through the same gateway try to vote, the voting site will think they are trying to vote from the same machine and will not allow the vote. Depending on how many users are accessing the Internet at a given time, there may be from 1 to 5 gateways operating.

So address yourselves to this: What's a nine-letter phrase for "hidden code that a web site receives from a computer"?

An evening of calls has established this: (None of the user names in what follows are their real names.) User:AnnMBake is an old friend who has heard my stories of my wiki adventures and was recently urged by a student to check it out. User:MengTheMagnificent is her friend and colleague who heard about wiki from her. So did another colleague of hers who is probably either User:Wylie Ali or User:Epistemologist but he's not home, so I can't confirm that. He was present with User:AnnMBake and User:MengTheMagnificent when the former described wikipedia. User:LogicMan sounds like a student, possibly the one who clued in User:AnnMBake about wikipedia. For the record, I've never met User:LogicMan (so far as I know). I've met, but only met, the person that is probably User:Wylie Ali or User:Epistemologist. I'm acquainted with User:MengTheMagnificent but we are in the same room together less than a dozen times a year. Make of this what you will, but none of us care enough about wikipedia to bother conspiring (or even running spellchecker ;-) ). -Nate Ladd (not logged in so everyone can see my -and probably many other people's- IP): --24.17.191.142 06:47, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: Disclosure. I did not solicit the textimonial located immediately above from the "com-putative ostensible source" (COS) that com-purportatively indexes itself within that very same "string of putative textuality" (SOPT) as User:24.17.191.142, and which text further asserts the identity of this COS, call it for the nonce COS1, with the COS User:Nathan Ladd, call it for this new nonce, say, nonce time t1, which nonce t1 is linked with the previous nonce, call it t0, in a way that most philosophers and even most physicists would concent is an extremely mysterious and still at this time, which further nonce time may be signified here, more exactly, in a particular ε-neighborhood of User:Jon Awbrey's immediate pixel coordinates (x, y), as yet another nonce time t3, poorly understood, much less articulated fashion. Well, so much for philosophers and physicists, as I read on Talk:Truth, and how could that be false to any man [sic, sic, tsk, tsk, but Polonius gets his due for a'that] that the issue is 3vial to every 1st-grader. Ah Bartleby! Ah Humanity!

JA: The "text in question" (TIQ) does in fact present us with a very in3guing invitation to contemplate a whole host of issues that are in fact very much on-topic so far as it concerns the life and work of Charles Sanders Peirce, namely, or pro-namely, the closely related topics of Haecceity and Indexicality, and it is my earnest hope that we will be able to persue these inquiries at some time in the near future, but for the time being we have a previous engagement. Jon Awbrey 12:48, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

See?" SEE? SEE? A truly objective forensic document examiner would have to admit that "quite often persons write the same 'n talk the same 'cause they're from the same place"!! Wouldn't ya think? ((Camera pans in slightly, all in robotic monotone: "We're from France!")... Kenosis 13:20, 14 June 2006 (UTC) In seriousness, I suppose I would attach an emoticon of some kind. to my last several comments, but I am not pleased about this situation no matter what the truth turns out to be. The evidence I see is disturbing, but I conintue to AGF with respect to all parties putatively involved in the current situation here. I presume we'll be seeing some good research from Jon in the upcoming days and a little lesson in just how improbable certain things actually are in life. Good day all, or any. Signed, the real Kenosis... Kenosis 13:31, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: Sorry, I cannot speak to that issue, as we Cyborg Clones (CC's) long ago had our Personal-Computer-Computer-Personalities (PC-CP)'s implanted as chips in the Cartesian coordinating systems of our pineal glands, and these PC-CP's emit such outracous amplitudes of Giga Ultra High Frequency (GUHF) Ω-radiation that we can't even dream — what Androids and Gynoids dream of is another story, but being neither a WP:Dick nor a Philip Kindred Dick I am proscriven by the applicable IP laws, no, the other IP laws, from replicating it here — of using your Humanely detached styles of PutoCondominia (PC's) or your Non-Hygenic Public Access Computers (PACs), no, the other PACs, in airports, cyborg cafes, hotels, and libraries. Jon Awbrey 13:36, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: For those who find themselves diverted by the above divertimento, the Moral of the Story is of course: How hard is it really nowadays to beg, borrow, or otherwise acquire another computer? Jon Awbrey 12:16, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

One could quibble about methodology in what I'm about to point out. But in very rough terms, if the odds of spelling "consensus" as "concensus" are 100-1 as stated above by the Google method of sampling, the probablity of doing it 7 consecutive times in a purely random sample is approximately one in every 1007 or 1014. That's a probability of about one in 10 trillion of the event we just witnessed.
Here's another methodology. There are roughly 300 million English speaking persons with internet access at present. Three out of a sample of five misspelled the word identically, representing 100% of the uses of the word by this sample of five usernames identified above. If the probability of a given person being in the habit of spelling "consensus" as "concensus" is 1 in every 100, any idea what the odds are against three out of five misspelling it that way at random? Hint: it's a very long number. Anyone recall the formulas? I'd say there's probable cause for some level of doubt.
Now, if you were to study web use thoroughly enough to calculate a rough probability of any five users at random being from the same location, there's another methodological factor. Hint: the result is a much larger very long number representing the odds against the recent event occurring purely randomly.
Talking point: Defense should prepare to argue that the confounding factor of usernames in the same location mitigates the probabilities or renders them unreliable. For instance, people could catch the misspelling from one another, etc. ... Kenosis 21:53, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: For my part, I do not intend to be distracted with these more incidental aspects of the problem — there's been more than enough distraction, destruction, diversion, and utterly wasted productivity already. But it does point to a host of more serious problems in WikiPedia that I do intend to devote a more focused attention to. 22:14, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Voting & Limits On The Power Of Consensus

It might be timely to draw your attention to Wikipedia:Voting is evil and related thoughts on voting on the Wiki. Voting rarely settles an issue here. Banno 22:09, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: Needs no ghost come from heaven to tell me that, Banno, but thanks at any rate. Jon Awbrey 22:15, 14 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: On a related issue, we have the following non-negotiable restriction on the power of WP:Consensus, a mere guideline, when it conflicts with any of the three main policies of WP, namely, WP:NOR, WP:NPOV, and WP:VER:

The three policies are non-negotiable and cannot be superseded by any other guidelines or by editors' consensus.

JA: This non-negotiable bound on the power of consensus has strong implications for the present situation. But then, it needs no ghost come from heaven to tell you that. Jon Awbrey 04:34, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

I suppose this incident could make fairly good grist for further consideration of an open-source procedural method analogous to Roberts rules of order? Or what? Perhaps mandatory re-education camps (online of course) for outvoted participants who insist on retaining their minority views? So, what does one do when this idea of consensus is stymied? Seems like the tradition thus far has been take a vote. This of course raises the ante for diligence in effectively resolving issues like sockpuppetry. It is an interesting and important set of tensions involved here, I would think. ... Kenosis 15:16, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: Yes, the slip from pseudo-democracy to mob rule to totalitarianism has always been an all too easy subsidance in history, but lucky for us one of the things that WP:ISNOT is an experiment in democracy, much less pseudo-democracy. (Definition. Pseudo-Democracy, where pseudo-voters can have as many damn pseudonyms as they damn well please.) Jon Awbrey 16:44, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

JA: Having had quite a lot of experience with the use of Robots Rules Of Order (R2O2) in standards body work, I can tell you that what it amounts to is yet another way for the special interest group that can afford the most expensive lawyers to impose their will on the body as a whole, no matter what the research says and no matter what the outcome of any vote. So we hardly need another tool like that. The O2 is already thick with 'em. Jon Awbrey 16:56, 15 June 2006 (UTC)

Re: "The O2 is already thick with 'em:" Ain't no kidding about that. ... Kenosis 02:27, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removed Section — Parallels with Leibniz

JA: Several editors in the past — none of them my avatars or personal associates — have objected to the irrelevant and speculative nature of this section. Being so much more "live and let live" in those early days of my tenure here, I was for my part willing to let it pass. But the more I read past it, the more I begin to agree that it simply does not seem to belong here. Jon Awbrey 15:42, 16 June 2006 (UTC)

Parallels with Leibniz

Peirce was aware that the breadth and depth of his ideas resembled those of the 17th century German polymath Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz; (see Fisch 1986: 249-60). But the parallels between Peirce and Leibniz were even more striking than he knew. One should keep in mind that the scope of Leibniz's achievement was not as well appreciated in Peirce's day as in ours. Both men were mathematicians, logicians, historians, philosophers of language and mind, and metaphysicians. Neither was by any means primarily educated in philosophy (Leibniz's degree was in law). Both were passionate about natural science and contributed thereto, dabbled in inventions, and worked on engineering projects. Both were fascinated by semiotics and mathematical notation, and the interplay between philosophy and mathematics. Both were surprisingly friendly to some parts of scholastic metaphysics as well as logic; e.g., Peirce frequently invoked the Scotistic notion of haecceity. Both published few books, many articles, and died leaving a vast amount in manuscript. The ideas of both men underwent oversimplification in the hands of others, and were little appreciated for some time after their deaths. The critical editions of the works of both men are far from complete. The secondary literature on both men mostly dates from the end of WWII. Leibniz differs from Peirce in his greater range, vast correspondence, freedom from financial difficulties, and his passionate Christianity.

[edit] To Box Or Not To Box

JA: I am moving this infobox here for re-consideration. Peirce has not been well-served by even the most well-meaning capsulizations of his supposed thought, and this particular capsule is just too inaccurate in its current state to be of any help to the reader . Jon Awbrey 12:08, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Let's discuss before removing. If you think some of the infobox data is incorrect, please correct it, or remove the data you know to be incorrect, instead of removing the whole thing to the talk page. Are the picture, the life dates and places, the interests and influences all incorrect? --Blainster 20:55, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

JA: Yes, some of the details are factually incorrect. For example, is somebody who lived from 1839 to 1914 and did some notable philosophy in both centuries to be labeled a "19th century philosopher"? What is the point of repeating the bio data that is already given in the lead of the article? Not much. Most of the rest of what's there is just the kind of distortion and just plain silliness that is forced by the bumper-sticker format of the whole thing. Do you really think that Peirce was "influenced" by Welby, more than, say, by Plato or Aristotle? And why are we even busting our expletives deleted to work on a genuine article if all that readers are likely to take away from it is a 1-liner webyte like "Notable Idea: Meaning as the sum of practical consequences" ??? So let me put it this way: Strong objection to this kind of irreputably damaging non-encyclopedic illustrated classic comic book nonsense. Jon Awbrey 21:26, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

OK, so let's remove the details deemed incorrect as previously suggested. Just because some of the facts are incorrect doesn't justify removing all of them. I understand that you do not wish to have Peirce summarized. However, Wikipedia exists to meet many needs, and its flexibility is enhanced by providing tools such as infoboxes for the benefit of those who seek just such summaries. If that is all they want, they won't be reading past the opening paragraph anyway, and we should not force them to struggle through erudite prose that many will not understand. Please re-read your scholarly post and consider your position, Jon. Peirce is obviously very important to you, but removing the infobox short-circuits our goal of spreading knowledge of him to a wider audience. --Blainster 23:36, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

JA: I sympathize with anybody who tries to improve an article. Anybody who knows my attitude toward WP knows that I am the least deletionist of anybody around, and I always do my best to salvage anything worth saving in anybody's contribution. But there is nothing to salvage here. The Infobox is by its very nature either utterly redundant or positively misinformative, and it takes up way too much valuable real estate at the top of the article doing it, making the actual lead of the article almost impossible to read. Maybe you could create a Peirce (infobox) article for the class of readers that you have in mind. You said it best — spreading knowledge — the infobox is not knowledge, it's a WikiPlacebo. Peirce is what he was, his thought was never a walk in the park, anybody who wants to work on making his thought more accessible is free to try, but not at the cost of mis-representing it. Jon Awbrey 00:48, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

Western Philosophy
19th/20th century philosophy
Name: Charles Sanders Peirce
Birth: September 10, 1839 (Cambridge, Massachusetts)
Death: April 19, 1914 (Milford, Pennsylvania)
School/tradition: Pragmaticism (Pragmatism)
Main interests: Metaphysics, Logic, Epistemology, Mathematics, Science
Notable ideas: Pragmaticism, Semiotics
Influences: Scotus, Reid, Hume, Kant, Bentham, Welby
Influenced: Welby, James, Royce, Dewey, Popper, Wiggins, Haack

I'm the creator of the infobox, so I'm going to be biased here. I don't think we disagree that the infobox has potential to be quite useful, though it does repeat some data from the intro paragraph. I created the infobox format because I like its accessibility. Before reading the article about the philosopher, I can see roughly how they fit into the philosophical landscape. I can see what thinkers had a great influence on them and what thinkers they themselves influenced. This alone tells me why I should read into the article more.

But this doesn't seem to be what we're arguing about here. It seems to Jon that there's no way for an infobox to be accurate or no way for it to not misreprsent information. Also in this I admit I'm not an expert on C.S. Pierce. I have used information in my reading to map in this infobox.

You will see that I've already changed some things based on Jon's comments (see Era, notable ideas). As for influences/influenced, I admit that I have no knowledge of Peirce in this area. Did Plato and Aristotle have a direct influence on Peirce? Then add them to the list.

We shouldn't give up on the infobox because the first draft has defects. This is the point of the wiki - we can fix it up over time. Maybe I'm hopelessly optimistic, but I don't see how an infobox will necessarily distort ideas. Jon, your comments are good, and we need more of them to make this infobox accurate.

FranksValli 06:48, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

I am a fan of infoboxs. All infoboxes have certain entries that are harder to work with than others, and Peirce is certainly one of the harder ones to work with. A infobox will work, but it will be one of the more complicated ones. What an infobox may do is needlessly repeat information in the main article. That is the only real criticism of the infobox. The box can be made to work, and it need not misreprsent, but does it really do anything? I vote we have an info box, but I do understand this part of JA's criticism. He may be right that "[t]he Infobox is by its very nature [ ] utterly redundant". {() 04:16, 6 July 2006 (UTC)}

JA: Infoboxes have the following problems:

  1. They are anti-wiki. I tried 3 or 4 ways of modifying their parameters, both here and at the template site, and none of it worked. I also made a number of comments on the Infobox talk page about how they needed to change, and none of these suggestions have been followed up.
  2. In philosophy at any rate, they are amatuerish and inherently distorted. If it was baseball players or racehorses maybe it would be okay -- there you have fairly standard stats and pedigrees to list. But trying to say who were the influencers and influencees of somebody like Peirce, much less Aristotle, cannot avoid the distortions that are due to selection bias and the result overall sounds just plain silly. Jon Awbrey 04:38, 6 July 2006 (UTC)
I really don't get your criticism. Is it a distortion to say, "He is a great American builder of an architectonic system, and his admirers deem him the most important systematizer since Kant and Hegel, who were major influences." Can we not single out 5 major influences because there were a large number of lesser influences, or because the entire context of philosophy was influenced by Plato and Aristotle? It makes total sense to provide major influences of a particular philosopher's work. Here's my real point: Not everyone is comming to this entry for a article-lenght introduction to Peirce. They want a ballpark estimation of Peirce so they can conceptually place him philosophically. I love reading Peirce, and so reading this long of an entry on him might be fine for me; however, I am not so interested in, e.g., Lovejoy, and so hitting upon an entry for him I might be just looking for the information contained in his infobox.

JA: I am not the one who included that part about the "Great American Builder" (GAB). Like a lot of the stuff in the Bio I suspect that it borders on Copyvio, and I would probably change it or else track down the proper citation, probably somewhere in Brent. For my part I try to avoid xs Peacockery, xs Nationalism, not to mention xs Copyvio. I just haven't myself got around to a copyedit of the Bio yet. Jon Awbrey 13:18, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

JA: There's a link to the Infobox on the first line. Yes, it's a distortion, especially in the case of someone like Peirce, to select 5 influencers and 5 influencees. Indeed, most of the very major distortions of Peirce's thought arise from the use of the Procrustean shoehorn on his actual work, trying to peg his ideas in precut categories that simply do not fit, even when those categories are used in their proper historical senses, which they seldom are anymore, even by supposedly professional philosophers who write a lot of pop phil works because they can slip under the bar of professional review. Take all the garbage that is written about Peirce the consensualist, Peirce the idealist, blah blah crapola ad infinitum. The fact is that people who content mostly themselves with writing that junk and people who are happy to quit with reading that junk do not give a R's A about distortion — they just want a bit of capsulized chit-chat to consume at their next Freshman Sop Hoc, Cocktail Party, or Rave. So who cares about that? Apparently, WP cares about that. So much for WP. Jon Awbrey 13:46, 6 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Biographical Data

JA: Cf. edit by Peruvianllama, citing WP:MOSDATE#Dates_of_birth_and_death:

[edit] "Signifier" and "signified"

Using the (rather Saussurian, or structuralist) notions of "signifier" and "signified" in order to present or explain Peirce's theory of the sign is misleading. In Saussurian parlance (or linguistic parlance at large) they rather correspond to the "sound" and "mental image" of the (diadic) sign, not to a reference process, and definitely not to Peirce's "representamen" and "object". I propose using Peirce's own analytical vocabulary (representamen, ground, object, interpretant), unless discussed otherwise. I have corrected accordingly the "icon-symbol-index" section. -- Typewritten 14:38, 24 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The introductory paragraph to the "Peirce's philosophy" section.

The section regarding Peirce's philosophy is pitiful. It begins with an opinionated and one-sided quote, giving the impression that his philosophy is of little consequence, when nothing could be further from the truth. From this point on it is difficult to tell what the purpose of the introductory paragraph is. If it is to give an impartial introduction to the subsections of his philosophy it is utterly unnecessary. It was either written by one idiot with an axe to grind, a multitude of idiots none of whom fully understand his philosophy, or some combination of the two. It should either be rewritten or removed.

-What is more, Peirce was not only familiar with a "few lines" of Kant but thoroughly understood. Also he was not only a philosopher for five or ten years as even a cursory knowledge of his life would reveal.

-If no one has any objections I am going to remove it. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by JohnDavidBurgess (talk • contribs) 04:39, 15 November, 2006 (UTC).

No objection, I think you can go ahead. -- Typewritten 23:29, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Logic as formal semiotic -- Material for abstracting

The following material from Putnam is probably important, but way too long for the point it makes. I have moved it here for abstracting before re-inclusion. Way of Inquiry 04:14, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Begin quote

On Peirce and his contemporaries Ernst Schröder and Frege, Hilary Putnam (1982) wrote:

When I started to trace the later development of logic, the first thing I did was to look at Schröder's Vorlesungen über die Algebra der Logik. This book … has a third volume on the logic of relations (Algebra und Logik der Relative, 1895). [These] three volumes were the best-known logic text in the world among advanced students, and they can safely be taken to represent what any mathematician interested in the study of logic would have had to know, or at least become acquainted with in the 1890s.

While, to my knowledge, no one except Frege ever published a single paper in Frege's notation, many famous logicians adopted Peirce–Schröder notation, and famous results and systems were published in it. Löwenheim stated and proved the Löwenheim–Skolem theorem … in Peirce's notation. In fact, there is no reference in Löwenheim's paper to any logic other than Peirce's. To cite another example, Zermelo presented his axioms for set theory in Peirce–Schröder notation, and not, as one might have expected, in Russell–Whitehead notation.

One can sum up these simple facts (which anyone can quickly verify) as follows: Frege certainly discovered the quantifier first (four years before O. H. Mitchell did so, going by publication dates, which are all we have as far as I know). But Leif Ericson probably discovered America 'first' (forgive me for not counting the native Americans, who of course really discovered it 'first'). If the effective discoverer, from a European point of view, is Christopher Columbus, that is because he discovered it so that it stayed discovered (by Europeans, that is), so that the discovery became known (by Europeans). Frege did 'discover' the quantifier in the sense of having the rightful claim to priority; but Peirce and his students discovered it in the effective sense. The fact is that until Russell appreciated what he had done, Frege was relatively obscure, and it was Peirce who seems to have been known to the entire world logical community. How many of the people who think that 'Frege invented [formal] logic' are aware of these facts?

The main evidence for Putnam's claims is Peirce (1885), published in the premier American mathematical journal of the day. Peano, Ernst Schröder, among others, cited this article. Peirce was apparently ignorant of Frege's work, despite their rival achievements in logic, philosophy of language, and the foundations of mathematics.

End quote

[edit] Organizational mess

This article is an organizational mess ... and a good example of how Wikipedia fails (for Jon and Ben's benefit). The whole thing needs to be restructured I think to focus on the subject and not the theories of the subject. --Steven Zenith 18:58, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

That'd be nice. I just wanted to write simple summaries defining the usual terms and relations for the general reader who would be encountering those terms and relations in any Peirce discussion. If every such summary is to be turned into a vast battleground over abstract theoretical emphases, the point is gone. Each section would need to be turned into its own article, and the general reader will find a series of links to long-winded articles written almost as if with the purpose of driving the general reader away. The Tetrast 17:54, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

We have to take the man as he was, and justify his ways as best we can. The simple fact is that Peirce frequently defines his concepts in abstract theoretical terms that cover vast arrays of more concrete examples. If you can find examples that are fully generic, then that is a good thing, but not especially easy to do. Sir Humphrey Appleby 19:38, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

To the contrary, Peirce often defines his terms in ways addressed to general audiences and not always in fully abstract theoretical ways. Since it is not easy to find "examples that are fully generic," one should do as Peirce did and give the reader things to hang onto.The Tetrast 19:46, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Nothing contrary about it -- please consult your square of opposition -- since these are in fact existential statements: (1) he frequently constructed abstract comprehenisve theories, (2) he frequently abstracted prescisive descriptions, and (3) he frequently indicated or invented concrete examples. The question is simply -- and I don't really mean "simply" of course -- what mix of strategies will work for such a diverse audience? I'm guessing it's like Scylla and Charybdis and the Wine Dark Straits that mediate them. Best to follow the Hippocratic Precept, and First Do No Harm. Way of Inquiry 12:26, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

Incidentally, I might note here that some of these sections have already been turned into separate articles, which you can reach by following the Main Article links under some of the headings. Sir Humphrey Appleby 19:38, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

The thing to remember here is that, as Aristotle pointed out, the order of being is opposite to the order of knowledge. The general reader needs to get a rough idea of the meanings of the most common terms and relations which he will encounter in a typical discussion of Peirce or by Peirce. A reference work can helpfully organize these terms and definitions in a way which reflects the theoretical rationales and discusses them at well chosen turns. Brevity in this is hard-won but valuable, and I'm still looking for ways to shorten the things that I've written. What's called for here is neither a dictionary of the terms nor a textbook of the theory, but brief summaries which get the usual initial confusions out of the way ("Is the interpretant the activity of interpretation or is it AN interpretation?" etc.), and which clearly identify in prominent places the chief terms and their often numerous synonyms or near-synonyms. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by The Tetrast (talk • contribs) 20:44, 12 February 2007 (UTC).
Come to think of it, I'd like to turn the Type of Signs section into a separate article, but I'm unsure what to call it -- the title should relate to Peirce but I'm unsure how. And should I say "classification" instead of "types"? "Types of signs (Peirce)"? "Classification of signs (Peirce)"? Is there some preferred way to refer to Peirce in the title other than parenthetically at the title's end? I have material to add to such an article, and also an idea of the summary which would take its place in the Peirce article and which would link to the Types of Signs artice.The Tetrast 22:35, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

If you check the See Also section at the end of the article, there are a number of different articles where an expanded treatment of Sign Types might fit, say Sign (semiotics). Slim Margin 15:00, 13 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Falsification

I don't remember the reference now - but someone might want to find it and add that Karl Popper acknowledges that Peirce preceded him in the development of the notion of falsification. --Steven Zenith 19:01, 11 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Determination

Moving the following paragraph to discussion for further work.

The object determines the sign to determine the interpretant to be related to the object as the sign is related to the object. Therefore this determines the interpretant as a sign to determine a still further interpretant, and semiosis ever continues.

The topic of multiple determination in Peirce will probably take a very careful treatment in its own right, as the casual reader will have a tendency to think of determination in the causal and dyadic terms of classical determinism, which we know would be misleading in the case of sign relations. Way of Inquiry 15:00, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

That's not what I wrote. With boldface added here to Way of Inquiry's omission, I wrote,

The object determines (in Peirce's sense of "specializes", bestimmt) the sign to determine the interpretant to be related to the object as the sign is related to the object. Therefore this determines the interpretant as a sign to determine a still further interpretant, and semiosis ever continues.

That alerts the reader that "determination" is not being used in the usual contemporary sense. Somebody could elaborate on this without simply removing the passage and then misquoting it.

Now, I haven't checked who removed my "a.k.a." alternatives -- "interpretant, a.k.a. interpretant sign", "object, a.k.a. semiotic object," "sign, a.k.a. representamen" -- but I don't see the point of this. These are just the things to which a general reader needs to be alerted in an introductory text.

I also see no reason for the elimination of the ordinal numbers from the kinds of object, signs, objects, and interpretants, unless somebody just want to play down Peirce's categorialism in semiotics, but this would not be true to Peirce. The Wikipedia help section itself specifies HTML to use for multi-level numbering. It would be frivolous to remove the numbering for the sheer sake of using Wiki list formatting. The Tetrast 15:57, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

I cannot speak to the determination issue right now, but simply by way of casual observations on the style issues, there are some likely eventualities that we may anticipate happening in this setting.

The WP:MoS and local customs have a thing against abbreviations, so barbarisms like "a.k.a" will eventually get replaced, and succesive editors over time will eventually degrade complex html markup anyway, so it's best to keep that as simple as possible. If you really need numbers, maybe "#" and "##" will do instead of "*" and "**".

I realize that Peirce is full of complexities and subtleties, but if you overwhelm the reader with all of them at once — nested parenthetical remarks and the full variorum of his usage — some editor will eventually just delete it en bloc. I know this is not easy to keep under control, but one must continue to try. Sir Humphrey Appleby 18:10, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

The numeration style needs to be specified and this is doable only with html. If somebody alters it, I will restore it. I'm not crazy about excessive parentheses either so I'll work on that. As for "a.k.a.," I'll replace it with "also called." As for overwhelming the reader with complexities, first of all the general reader needs to be not overwhelmed with abstract theoretical emphases which result in the most prominent terms going scattered and undefined. The Tetrast 18:39, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I understand and fully sympathize. Let me emphasize that those are just my observations with regard to the sorts of things that I have seen happen hereabouts. Better to anticipate the effects than to suffer the consequences, I always say. Sir Humphrey Appleby 19:26, 12 February 2007 (UTC)

The point about determination is that the explanation in place does not do the job that it needs to do. Maybe if one glosses the German term bestimmt (and can do that without a long parenthetical intrusion (oder eine Fußnote, u.s.w.)) then it might alert the reader that something distinctive is going on, but right now it merely detours the reader without providing the essential information, namely that we are concerned here with tri-relative determinations that cannot be accounted for in terms of the more familiar sorts of bi-relative determinations. Way of Inquiry 12:42, 14 February 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Jon Awbrey" problem

Since this page is the hangout of this man, I will leave my comment here. The sockpuppets of this banned user are getting even more out of control. Take a look at the history of edits to this article within the past month - all of them largely by the same person under different names. Please do not let the multiple names fool you.

Starting from February 1st, here's just a sampling of his sockpuppets: The Tetrast, Sir Humphrey Appleby, Brought Forth, Edvard Munchkin, Brought Forth, Love And Fellowship, Conceived In Liberty, Four Score And Seven Years Ago, Knight Of The Woeful Countenance, Way of Inquiry, Santiago Saint James, Our Fathers, Sir Humphrey Appleby, On This Continent, Slim Margin. FranksValli 02:54, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Incidence of banned User:Jon Awbrey using sockpuppets should be reported at Wikipedia:Suspected sock puppets. Note that the instructions say that the report should be made within one week of suspected edits. --Blainster 09:08, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Since Awbrey began editing this article on December 22, 2005, and has so thoroughly obfuscated it since then, I suggest we roll the article state back to that date and begin from there once the sockpuppets have been blocked. --Blainster 09:24, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

Blainster, can you say why you think it's him? SlimVirgin (talk) 09:51, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
Note that it was FranksValli who brought this to our attention. I looked at a number of the entries and they are very typical of Awbrey's style of writing. I hesitated to put a request at WP:SSP because that page says the edits should be within the past week. It would probably be best to do a checkuser to make sure the IP range matches, but you can see the similarity of names and they have all started editing since Awbrey's ban last September. I am less sure of "Love and Fellowship", and possibly "Sir Humphrey". --Blainster 10:36, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
Why not order a check-user of these usernames listed above? There were so many of these over the past eight months that there was a category named "Category:Sockpuppets of banned user Jon Awbrey" or something to that effect (which may have since been deleted in a CfD). I believe there have been in excess of forty to date. User:KillerChihuahua is familiar with this set of events — perhaps you might want to consult with that admin as well. … Kenosis 14:30, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
I've gone ahead and blocked them. See Category:Wikipedia sockpuppets of Jon Awbrey and Category:Suspected Wikipedia sockpuppets of Jon Awbrey. SlimVirgin (talk) 04:22, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

Almost every editor who has edited this page since October 2006 has been a Jon Awbrey sock; I count at least a dozen. Jayjg (talk) 05:37, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

  • Maybe when someone is that persistent and is not actually trying to wreck the place, we need to make an effort to channel them into productivity. I recognise the difficulty inherent in doing that, particularly in Jon's case, but I don't see why we can't approach it with that aim. The alternative is endless whackamoling and stress for all concerned. Grace Note 03:49, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Before you can take up any other issues, you need to deal with the fact that SlimVirgin improperly reverted and Kenosis improperly deleted the good faith edits of many editors who can have no possible relationship to the accused editor, many of which contributions are so long standing that they precede the editor-in-question's first edits on this article. In addition, those who have been watching the history of this article know that a very large number of these edits were specifically worked out in collaboration to address the problems that are expressed above on this discussion page. My suggestion is that you return the article to the Consensual and Collaborative condition that it was in before the recent false charges and improper actions, and that you re-acquaint yourself with such basics of chivalry and common sense scholarship as were once and hopefully future enscounced under the capitals of the Wikipedia Five Pillars. On that understanding, and only that, it may be possible to proceed to the next tourney on the list. Created Equal 05:12, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
  • There is no foundation for further discussion until the editors and administrators who have acted improperly understand the fact that they have severely disrespected the efforts of many previous editors on this article, and until they reverse their erroneous actions. For me to accept the current state of the article is to acquiesce and condone that level of gross disrespect for other editors. And that I will not do. Created Equal 21:50, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Reducing the article to a manageable size

I am beginning to remove some of the excessively specific material from this article on the heels of this unfortunate set of events discussed above. I'm placing all significant chunks of removed material in Talk:Charles Peirce/Cache in the event some of it may be useful in a topic fork in the future. No doubt it took a great deal of work for Jon Awbrey to assemble, but the vast majority of it is either unsourced or based on primary sources by Peirce, and simply too much for the main article on Charles Peirce. Please feel free to adapt, undo, or partially re-use as appropriate. ... Kenosis 13:02, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

After transferring several subsections to Talk:Charles Peirce/Cache, I placed the rest of the current content in its entirety on that page, so that all current content can be found should it be necessary, without needing to parse through the article history. ... Kenosis 15:04, 11 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Franks Valli Has Born False Witness

  • And Blainster has vandalized this discussion page based on that false witness. Created Equal 14:38, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
Because anyone can edit and anyone can change IP numbers with a new service provider (many have a first month free come-on); Wikipedia necessarily bans personalities and not persons. If one has a personality identical to one banned for behavior caused by that personality, it does not matter if the person is the same or not. Jon was great in the article space but more trouble than he was worth in the talk space. If you fit that personality profile, please edit the articles but stick to non-Wikipedian talk spaces for talk. Your friend, WAS 4.250 22:52, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm not sure I want to analyze the implications of a ban on both an IP address and a personality profile. In general, the latter (banning a peronality profile) seems to involve difficulties in forming a stable enough operational definition to justify any action more assertive than saying "please let the consensus process take its course" ... Kenosis 01:33, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
That said, it's fairly obvious User:Created Equal is Jon Awbrey or a magical co-conspirator of some sort. I removed the last edit by this "user" with the edit summary: Reverting attempted reinsertion of "technical" tripe by an obvious sockpuppet of banned User:Jon Awbrey. See WP:OWN ... Kenosis 02:57, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
If I'm wrong, have the lawyer file for a court-ordered check-user and sue me for saying "obvious" instead of "possible" or "alleged" sockpuppet. ... Kenosis 03:02, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
For all his faults, Jon is a human being, trying to add material to Wikipedia in good faith. I think you should bear that in mind. I'm reserving an opinion whether his vision of the article is better or worse than yours, but it's nothing like as clearcut as you seem to think. And WAS, I am quite surprised to see you describe someone as "more trouble than they're worth", particularly someone who wants to contribute content. Although, having said that, I advise Jon to ratchet himself down a few notches, and try to keep in mind that the powerless cannot make edits by force here, and trying to leads only to upset for both the adder and those who don't want the addition. In any case, it's the behaviour that is banned, not the person. If the person comes back, does not repeat the behaviour and sticks to the norms of the community, there is no problem with that, and to seek to exclude them or their material is simply vindictive and petty. Please treat Jon and his puppets with that in mind. Grace Note 03:46, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
WP:AGF is not a mental suicide pact, nor is it a requirement to submit to other editors' insistence on article ownership in violation of WP:NOR, which strongly discourages personal syntheses based on widely debated primary sources. And, inclusion in the class of entities known as human beings is not an automatic entitlement to violate the policies and practices of Wikipedia, participation in which is an entitlement arising from within the structure of WP, not an automatic right based on being a human being. Further, sockpuppetry, as it is known within WP, is a significant enough departure from good-faith participation in the WP:Consensus process to merit not only the exclusion to which Jon Awbrey has been officially subject, but also for the exclusion of Jon's participation under the guise of the many other "signs" which such a banned former-user may choose to use.
Either way, there has been no justification put forth on this talk page for the inclusion of the just-removed material, nor in the article in the form of citations from others' than the editor who wishes to throw this form of material in there as deisred. A review of the talk page will confirm that this is not the first time this issue has come up with respect to this article. In the end, the content of this article will depend on a consensus about how to reasonably present to the reader a summary of Charles Peirce, and not a paper about what one user surmises are the highly technical minutia that must be presented from all the voluminous books, papers, articles and notes of Charles Peirce. ... Kenosis 04:12, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
WP:AGF is not a mental suicide pact This is a non sequitur. Sorry but it is. Jon is not malicious. You might consider it a suicide pact to continue to accommodate Jon, but that doesn't speak to his good faith, which I consider unquestionable. I think you need to understand that his sense of ownership is born out of his knowledge of the subject area, which (I don't mean to insult you by saying it) lack. I think you should bear that in mind. As for the rest of your first paragraph, I simply do not appreciate your tone, and can't find anything in it that merits discussion. Try not to speak to me or anyone else like they're shit from now on. Continuing to do so is not going to win you many friends.
To your second paragraph. I think Jon has many times defended his edits. That's part of the problem! I want to remind you though that "consensus" does not necessarily imply that we simply round up a majority and it gets its way. You need to make the effort to convince all that you are in the right. Personally, I tend to agree with WAS that the additional material should not be omitted entirely, but could be placed in supplementary articles, and I'd be interested to see Jon's view on that. He is not going away, regardless how pompously you spout policies at him, or at others here, so let's try to work together, with him included, to achieve a solution that all can live with. Grace Note 06:46, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

(<---) Grace Note, my phrase "more trouble than they're worth" was solely meant to objectively describe the subjective evaluation by members of the community when they decided on a community ban for Jon. He refused to stop acting in a way on talk pages that no one else found useful or productive and many found disruptive and incomprehensible. His edits on Wikipedia Review show that his method of communicating contains no malice but does contain a great deal of personality driven aspects that gets in the way of communicating for the purpose of achieving a consensus. He prefers to pun rather than to be clear. And the more upset he gets the less clear his communication, which is better than being incivil I guess but the people involved simply had all they could take and said enough! goodbye!. His edits to articles were always beyond reproach in all aspects except OWN. WAS 4.250 04:50, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

I think he considers that he is being clear. Okay, so let's agree that he isn't. And it is frustrating for other editors to have to work through his chatter. Let's agree on that. But he isn't going away, is he? So can we agree that we need a framework in which we can find a resolution that all are happy with, including Jon? Grace Note 06:46, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Kenosis, please respect Jon as a recognized expert on the subject of this article and while he may be wrong about some things - especially about successfully communicating with others - we don't want to drive off expertise. We want to encourage contributions that we can use. A ban is no excuse to throw away useful work. If you don't understand something, that is no reason to delete it. Moving it to a specialist article can make sense. Maybe the stuff moved out of here can be placed in an article dedicated to this man's ideas. Maybe Jon can help with that. He was not banned due to behavior on articles. Do not revert good work done in article space. WAS 4.250 04:50, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

I think this is an excellent suggestion. I don't think the article should simply be filleted because it seems too difficult to Kenosis. Many articles -- particularly on technical subjects -- are difficult (I was reading about ergodicity today and I barely understood a word). The level of technical difficulty should probably not be too high in a biography, but the material that Jon is adding should not just be thrown away. Grace Note 06:46, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  • A competent encyclopedia article on a major logician, mathematician, natural scientist, and philosopher will scarcely limit itself to an overview of his or her biography. Indeed that is the least of it, and in some people's views of the matter almost incidental. The work's the thing that needs to be covered, and related to its time and ours. And Dedicated To 15:42, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  • I have restored the edits that were improperly reverted by SlimVirgin based on the above false charges. And you're welcome. And Seven 19:28, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Kenosis, your notion of WikiPapal Infallibility is a dangerous and addictive habit to fall into. Three months worth of valid edits by The Tetrast and many others were improperly reverted by SlimVirgin based on false charges by FranksValli and Blainster. This was a mistake. It is best to admit it and correct it. Please do not compound it simply out WikiPerverse willfulness. And Seven 13:22, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Accessibility Questions

Jon, this article needs to be more clear to our average reader. The more complicated stuff needs to be in a different article. You must accept that the opinions of others have value even if you don't understand how that can be so. Is truth miscommunicated still truth? WAS 4.250 04:50, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

  • I agree with this. Jon, you need to get a grip on the idea that the article is aimed at a general readership, and Kenosis is probably representative of it. Can we look at trying to find a middle ground, in which the biography is kept relatively light (however unbearable that feels) and more in-depth material is abstracted out to more technical articles? Grace Note 06:46, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  • There has never been any dispute about the need to spin off separate articles when sections of this one grow too large. If you take the trouble to read the previous discussion, plus following up some of the {{main}} and See Also links, you will find:
  1. Jon Awbrey has been doing most of this work all along.
  2. Jon Awbrey has not written or even edited much of the Bio section, except to correct the most egregious errors and to try and supply a few references where a previous editor failed to give proper attributions for material "borrowed" from standard biographies.
  3. It was SlimVirgin's recent revert that re-introduced most or these defects back into the article.

Grace Note, a few comments about the possible road ahead, before we return to the enabling conditions of further progress.

  1. I know General Reader — General Reader is a friend of mine — and although Kenosis may be one general reader, he does not represent the interests of all readers who come to Wikipedia looking for information about a subject of interest to them. And Dedicated To 13:44, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  2. No one has ever disputed the desirability of making knowledge accessible to the general reader, by which I mean the widest possible audience. We have all discussed this many times before. From information available to me, 2007 marks the 40th year since Jon Awbrey began his dedicated study of Peirce's works, and nobody devotes that big a chunk of his or her life to a study without desiring to make the fruits of it as widely available as possible. A lot of that cannot be included here — you will find that students of Peirce are especially well-versed in the difference between original research and sourced research — and so it will not be included here. And Dedicated To 13:44, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  3. Where people differ on the question of accessibility does not appear to be in its desirability as a goal, but on the best path to achieve it. There are many subjects currently included in Wikipedia that many readers will find they need a "leg up" on before they can comprehend them fully. It is of course not always necessary to comprehend a subject fully in order to benefit from reading about it, but it would be nice if the requisite "leg up" could also be found in Wikipedia. Obviously, this takes organization, planning, some trial and error, and just plain a lot of dedicated work to achieve. Some of us have been doing a whole lot of this work for years on end now. If drive-by, fly-by editors cannot respect that, then the overall quality of Wikipedia articles will fail to improve over time. And Dedicated To 13:44, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Obstacles To Collaboration

Jon, thank you very very much for all your hard word and dedication in helping to bring knowledge to the world in this free (libre) encyclopedia (Wikipedia Review does not get the free culture aspect at all). Please let the past stay in the past as far as regretable interactions with certain wikipedians. We all have our flaws and wikipedia does not do revenge or punishment as a rule (although individuals certainly do in spite of the rules, especially when they are the ones interpreting the rules). So let us move forward rather than create unneeded barriers. You are respected by those you are now interacting with here on this page and anyone who does not respect you should stay the heck away from this page. But even those who respect you may differ with you or even block or ban you if you appear to be hurting wikipedia rather than helping. You need to behave in a way that leaves no doubt that you are being helpful. Being insulting and demanding leaves doubts. Getting in revert wars leaves doubts. You have doubts about their being helpful, no doubt - but if your goal is to give the gift of free knowledge to the world, fighting that fight now is not a good strategy. First regain your standing in this community by showing you can play well with others. WAS 4.250 15:58, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

  • Playing well with others is a two-way street, not that I'm saying to go play in the street. Since writing a high quality article is a lot of work, the word collaboration is slightly less misleading for what we should be trying to do here. Collaboration means working with others. Right at this moment, the biggest obstruction to genuine collaboration on this article is the fact that some Wikipedia Administrators and Wikipedia Editors have failed to respect the contributions of other editors in the way that Wikipedia Policies espouse. Until that obstruction is removed by the people who created it there can be no hope of true collaboration on this article. And Dedicated To 17:16, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Terminology

In the intro paragraph I changed "semeiotic" to "semiotics" to be consistent with the other use of the term in the same paragraph. I see there are separate entries on each term; however, "semeiotic" is defined as Peirce's own particular take on theory of signs. Therefore, I reason that his "contribution" is to semiotics generally, not just his own "semeiotic". Aldrichio 14:06, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes, the history here is complex. Peirce used both terms, in both singular and plural. For a long time it was conventional in the literature to use "semiotics" for Peirce's spin and "semiology" for Saussure's spin on things, but that got mushed over in popular writing during the last 20 years or so. Partly as a result of that, the Wikipedia article on semiotics has inherited a lot of that confusion, in its present state being very misleading as far as Peircean semiotics goes. Until that article can be sorted out, a reasonable stop-gap strategy in the meantime has been to use "semeiotic" for specifically Peircean stuff and "semiotics" for the general run. That distorts history a bit, but it will have to do for the moment. Created Equal 15:06, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

Regarding Charles Peirce's particular theory of relations, why not simply start an article on Charles Peirce's theory of relations and place that material in such a location for now, with a link from the article on Charles Peirce? The material, originally submitted by Jon Awbrey under his own name, can be found fully intact at Talk:Charles Peirce/Cache... Kenosis 15:40, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Those of us who have been labouring here for the last year, going on two, will know that many related articles have already been spun off from the main Peirce article and that User:Jon Awbrey, now defunked, was early on encouraged by the local interest group to organize this effort. As reported in the archives somewhere, Jon Awbrey looked around Wikipedia for established models of related article complexes, and found that folks in Literature had some of the best arrangements. For example, see the complex of articles related to Chaucer and his works. It was also observed that articles with titles like "So-and-so's approach to such-and-such" were generally deprecated for using that form — I forget the exact cases, but a lot of them seemed to involve Ken Wilber, I think. So it was decided to follow the Chaucer rather than the Wilber model. Accordingly, there are sub-articles and stub-articles on many of Peirce's individual works, and many on topics that Peirce initiated, or brought to new life, but that have developed further in the years that came after him. If size matters, then 80 to 100 kb is not out of bounds for a figure of Peirce's stature. But simply deleting essential aspects of Peirce's work from respectable coverage in the main article is not an acceptable way to it cut it down. Created Equal 17:02, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
Without reviewing the articles, I'm guessing that our articles on Einstein and his ideas might be a proper model for how to break up information on a man and his important, yet to the general public, difficult to understand efforts. WAS 4.250 21:31, 13 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Invitation

  • For a moment there, I thought that Reason, Pure or OtherWise, had returned to Wikipedia. But it seems to come in lurches and bakwashes. On jugera, I guess. Sadly, the present state of Wikipedian censorship and gag-ordering does not permit me to discuss these matters further here. Those of you who still remember how to behave like scholars are invited to the Peirce Corner of our Public House at the Wikipedia Review. Created Equal 15:30, 13 March 2007 (UTC)
  • If I must speak now for Jon Awbrey and Created Equal, and all the other silenced voices, then I will say that I truly appreciate the fact some editors are trying to live by The Old Wiki Code, even if it must now be my Memory Of The Spirit, far more than the Fickleness Of Its Letter, that I hold in my heart. Edios. I stop somewhere waiting for you … All Men Are 01:30, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Have you people completely lost all sense of how normal people view your actions, that give the lie to all your espoused ideals of openness and transparency? The Proposition That 14:28, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
  • I count this as three more sockpuppets of Jon Awbrey, right here in this section alone. The refusal of Jon Awbrey, under the auspices of his many sockpuppets, to accept that well-researched material and personal commentary on that material (in this case Peirce's voluminous and often oblique writings) can legitimately be subject to editorial discretion of others is simply beyond me. I mean, what is this? playing the role of Don Quixote with a multiple personality disorder or something? Some of us, including Jon, watched some unfortunate sockpuppeting happen before on this and another talk page involving another WP user, and I should think one would avoid this kind of approach based on that experience, rather than replicate it ad absurdum. Unfortunately I'm also reminded of the fellow who worked for three years on his doctoral thesis, didn't like the doctoral advisor's recommendations for the material he presented and demanded peer review of the situation. Then after getting knocked down in peer review, rumor has it that he then went to a bunch of publishers with the material and came up empty, then went and bought an old luger — that was a couple years ago, and we still wonder every now and again whether he'll make the headlines and what the headline will read. What I mean to say here is — sometimes things get a bit ridiculous after awhile, and it'd be very preferable in general to see some other course taken than the present one. Do have a nice week, and stay in touch, OK?. ... Kenosis 15:22, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Collaboration is possible only on the basis of respect — respect for each other, respect for all of the ideals that we espouse, respect for those that came before us, and respect for the subject of the article. When that basis is in place, then people can begin to collaborate on producing a high quality article about the subject in question, but not before. The Proposition That 15:40, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
Jon, you have established that you have a consensus with yourself. Quite the puppet play. But all your characters sound alike. I read the same critisism of Isacc Asimov's characters. I think at least one should be Spanish. Si? 4.250.168.36 18:34, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
I have to disagree with you 4.250.168.36. A Spanish speaking puppet that takes up where Jon left off would be like totally transparent, ya know? So, like, I suggest a French speaking puppet that takes up where Jon left off. Like, cuz that'd totally work. Ya, know? Oui? WAS 4.250 19:10, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
You are both wrong. Taking up where Jon left off is the give-away. You need three or so socks that care about this article and want to improve it in mildly differing ways. Let them argue with each other but agree in the end and thus improve this article. 5.250.168.36 19:70, 14 March 2007 (UTC)
No that won't work. They'd see right through that. You have to have socks that oppose what Jon was trying to do and in the end claim to make the article better but actually make it worse according to the standards and criteria that Jon was using to make it better. Has Vietnam taught you guys nothing? Sometimes you have to destroy something to save it.6.250.168.36 19:80, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

For reference: of the eight users in this section so far, only two are distinct people: Kenosis and Jon Awbrey (under 7 different aliases). FranksValli 02:36, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

FranksValli, I know that you did not intend it, but you have made a serious error in your original charge. As a result, the good faith contributions of many editors over a 3 month period were reverted by SlimVirgin. I am trying to save all of you the shame of finding this out later rather than sooner, but many of you have so far remained recalcitrant to receiving the information. And Dedicated To 03:46, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Sockpuppets, you are wrong. 32kB is the recommended length for the entire article. We just removed, and the sockpuppets keep replacing, 32kB worth of excess highly technical material that if anything should be published with a free host, and at most a link from this article. Even without this material the article's still roughly double the recommended length. Note that WP recommendations, such as for article length, can be altered by consensus of WP users and NOT by a fabricated "consensus" of sockpuppets. And that's not the only issue with this article, though it's one of the more conspicuous ones ... Kenosis 11:05, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
Kenosis, You know perfectly well, at least, I think you do, that 32 kb is an obsolete limit based on the page edit specs that some browsers had almost 10 years ago. There are tons and tons of Wikipedia articles that exceed that size, as befits their subjects. Everybody is trying to write as succinctly as possible, and Peirce was especially noted for doing so, but that does not always make for ease of comprehension. So let us put aside these red herrings and address the real issues. And Dedicated To 15:15, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Peircing

I think you're too harsh in your attempts to reconcile the Charles Peirce article. More flies with honey, you know. If you take a look at Benkler's breakdown of commons-based peer-production, you'll see that social capital is extremely important, and your unwillingness to invest it (Through your decisions to label certain activities as vandalism even knowing that it would bother other users and your strident tone in supporting your changes — which often include good information) is not an idealistic stand. Wikipedia is no different than any other commons-based peer project, and requires of its volunteers a volunteer ethic. More often than not, if you calm down, extend the olive branch and be the bigger person, it is not actually a sign of weakness but a sign of strength. Elijahmeeks 16:40, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Dear Elijahmeeks, I appreciate the spirit of your remarks, but there are many aspects of the current situation and its history of which I am guessing you are unaware. A number of false accusations have been made. From the information available to me I know that they are false, but some of the actors in this drama are unwilling to consider even the possibility that they may be wrong. In the meantime, acts have been taken on the basis of these charges: (1) acts that are destructive to the article, in ways that violate foundational principles of Wikipedia, The Five Pillars, just for starters, and (2) acts that grossly disrespect the contributions of many, many previous editors. Until those errors are reversed, there can be no hope of truly collaborative work. The Proposition That 17:08, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

It seems to me it's gone beyond arguing the merits of what happens to your edits or anyone else's. You were banned. Therefore, what you're doing now is being an outlaw. You need to quit messing with the article. It's highly disruptive. Time to move on. Aldrichio 18:14, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

I have a different view of history. Let me explain through example: I'm a big Jefferson fan — which means I hate Hamiltonians — I mean, I loathe Hamiltonians. But I acknowledge that their contribution to the creation of the United States was valuable and important. Even when it was destructive to knowledge and freedom. These models of commons-based development are extremely resilient, production (And not contribution)-centric and, most importantly, demonstrate a marked ability to leave the hands of those who don't respect the model (Either through forking or dissipation). The cultivation of civility and empathy to the point of submission is itself Strength and not weakness. Well, I feel like I've gone a little too touchy-feelie … hopefully it hasn't done damage to the point I was trying to make. Elijahmeeks 18:24, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Everything I know I learned in grade school, and mucking through the old archives on the whole Awbrey mess. But I find that my lack of knowing the precedents is often a strength, as I've got no axe to grind. I've read your contributions and they seem to be lucid and I've read the complaints of others and they seem to be lucid, as well. It's like that old, sad song: There ain't no good guys and there ain't no bad guys. I'm not particularly Wikipedia-community minded but, in this case, I figured I'd throw in my pair of pesetas. Elijahmeeks 18:11, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

There's nobody here but us humans — 'cept for the bots — there will be a Turing Test at mid-semester, but in the meantime we will simply have to WP:AH (Assume Humanity ⇒ Ergo Error). So I don't know if making a mistake makes anyboty a BadGuy/Gal/Bot. But the mistake only gets compounded if one cannot accept and correct it. FYI, there are at least 3 independent Peirce scholars/students active on the Peirce article at present, with more than 60 years of cumulative experience reading and discussing Peirce's work. It's a crying shame that they have to waste time redoing the good work that they have already done and fighting these procedural battles instead of working to improve the article. The Proposition That 18:30, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps you should look at this in a more dispassionate, more dialectic manner. Instead of "redoing good work" and "wasting time", why not think of it as "continuing to take part in dynamic knowledge creation". This doesn't need to be so adversarial and it would likely win you some friends, who would support your edits and allow you to do good work. This sounds like selling out, but it's not, it's acknowledging the value of community and community currency. We're all in this together … aw, nuts, I'm going all hippie again. Elijahmeeks 18:53, 14 March 2007 (UTC)

Elijahmeeks, Those are fine-sounding sentiments, but they are spoken in the absence of an acquaintance with the realities of the present situation. False charges were made. As a result, 3 months of good faith edits were reverted without a glance. That is not what I would call "dynamic knowledge creation". It is blind irrational destruction. It also violates the wisdom that is contained in basic elements of Wikipedia culture and policy like WP:5P and WP:EP which advise us to avoid wholesale deletion in favor of gradual improvement. And Dedicated To 04:00, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Well, I'm a human being, so far as I'm aware, and I'm generally against content destruction. I'd like people to stop reverting Jon's edits blind. It's not achieving any good purpose. And Jon, in return, I'd like you to start discussing a framework for the article, or articles, that can work for all. You are not going to be able to maintain a dense, difficult article for Peirce's biography. I recognise that density equals accuracy in a sense, but the general reader cannot easily handle difficulty all that well. If we could abstract some of the more detailed material to subarticles, so that it remains available to the interested reader, and leave the biography as something that the more general reader can easily come to grips with, it might not be wholly satisfying for you, but it will be a step towards resolving the conflict. Grace Note 06:57, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree with Grace Note. WAS 4.250 16:05, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Grace Note and WAS 4.250, Thanks, I know you both mean well, and I know I should probably wait an hour before swimming into these waters, but please do not lecture the Peirce scholars and students already assembled here in that tone of voice to "start discussing a framework for the article", as none of us has ever had the slightest difficulty, among ourselves, about talking first and shooting later. And Dedicated To 16:40, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Ohhh … Well aren't we sensitive. WAS 4.250 16:46, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Yes, A Bit Tetchy. But Whomans are like that, yeah they are. And I know as much as And Dedicated To must have truly e-joyed chatting with you Nice Cops while the Mean Cops snuck around behind his-her back with gag and handcuffs, I think that you can probably understand how a thing like that might make a dude or dudess just a tiny bit Edgy and Jumpy, if not utterly Itchy and Scratchy. Zelda Zilwaukee 19:30, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
I think we're at the point where Wikipedia needs to note the difference between vandalism and public protest. It would seem like the case here is not vandalism, or really anything so malicious, but rather a form of activism. I don't support it, but it should be addressed in the proper manner. Elijahmeeks 20:06, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  • Thanks for understanding. I know not what course others may take, but I do not do vandalism. That is because I recognize a responsibility to my most incidental reader that transcends all other considerations. If Wikipedia Administrators would only recognize these same responsibilities, they would quit dreaming that they can wish the world away, and they would stop obstructing reporters and scholars who have long been carrying the burden of these responsibilities. Zelda Zilwaukee 20:20, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
I'm not entirely sympathetic, of course. But it is apparent that the size and accuracy of the Charles Peirce article on Wikipedia is not what's important here. I studied philosophy in my undergrad, and I had no idea who Peirce was until a year ago. So we can't argue that the Charles Peirce article is fundamental to society at large (Unlike, say, Terrorism, Abortion, States' Rights or some other contentious socio-political battle that is rooted in definition). That's why, I feel, it makes for a good place to discuss Wikipedia Activism. As much as we'd like to cordon of what Wikipedia is not, the definition of the role and importance of Wikipedia is itself a collaborative effort between the community here and society at large (In the form of media and activists). Wikipedia has grown so important that these arguments are no longer arguments between amateur encyclopedists and are now public discourse between concerned citizens. Elijahmeeks 20:36, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

The Wikimedia Foundation has an education charter and it sounds to me as if you intend to be Jon-on-Wheels in order to either give Wikipedia an education or to receive one. Somehow I doubt this article will be improved in the process. And I know that I do not care to play a part in your proposed process of mutual education though "activism". So with fond hopes dashed, I bid you a sad farewell. WAS 4.250 00:05, 16 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Size Matters ???

I still think this is probably a red herring, or maybe just a guy thing, but I went ahead and tabulated a sample of current data on article size for major philosopher-scientists. And Dedicated To 16:30, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Aristotle 47 kb
Plato 72 kb
Leibniz 81 kb
Kant 74 kb
Peirce check today's menu
Russell 79 kb
Wittgenstein 62 kb

I think 64 kb (plus or minus 20 kb) is a good size to shoot for. WAS 4.250 16:49, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Again, these are incidental issues. One can keep them in mind, but they do not drive the work. Normal practice in writing any kind of article for publication dictates writing for accuracy and coverage of the essential topics on the first several passes, then turning to considerations of "space" on the final tune-ups. Simply deleting a whole section that you did not feel like reading may be a solution for the drive-by editor who wants to exercise a will to power, but it is not a solution for those who genuinely care about the quality of the article and the subject covered in it. And Dedicated To 17:00, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

Very true. It is also true that working environments without the clever little digs are more fun to work in than ones with. And since we are a volunteer effort, it helps not to drive people away with an unpleasant atmosphere. I guess being sensitve towards the feelings of others is more useful than being sensitive towards slights to oneself. Oh well. That really is too much to ask, I suppose. We can't very well have a saints only policy, can we? WAS 4.250 17:20, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
  • 'Nuff said, I think. We all understand the capacity limitations on human attention that have nothing to do with the number of trees pulped to display a web-article. On the other hand, there is no required reading list on Wikipedia. I have never once noticed the kilo-bytage of any article that I have surfed past and dipped into on my own — and I can't really remember reading the whole of any article on the first few scans. And Dedicated To 17:40, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Protection Request

I don't have any experience with this, but I'm going to request that the article be given protected status. As I understand it, protected articles can only be edited by administrators, and semiprotected articles can only be edited by users who have been registered for at least four days. I'm guessing that Mr. Awbrey has an inventory of these "sock-puppet" user names, and thus would not necessarily be affected by semi-protection. So I will request full protection.

This war of reversions is totally ridiculous and makes Wikipedia into a laughing stock for anybody actually trying to do research on Peirce. It seems to me that most users would rather leave the article completely untouched for as long as it takes to resolve this, than to have the article undergoing a radical change in appearance every 12 hours.Aldrichio 20:22, 15 March 2007 (UTC)

It appears that the banned user in question has been indef blocked. I have hence unprotected this article. Let me know if there are further problems. Cheers, Fang Aili talk 14:46, 28 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] This article has been copied to Opencycle

See http://www.opencycle.net/wiki/Talk%3ACharles_Peirce. WAS 4.250 21:25, 18 March 2007 (UTC)

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