Changes

Any object, anything grasped as a whole, can be a sign.  Indeed, the entire life of a person or a people can serve as sign unto itself or others and take on a significance all its own.  In converse fashion, every sign token is an object in the world.  In this role, a sign is forced to obey the ruling and relevant natural laws and empowered to take on a dynamics all its own.

Any object, anything grasped as a whole, can be a sign.  Indeed, the entire life of a person or a people can serve as sign unto itself or others and take on a significance all its own.  In converse fashion, every sign token is an object in the world.  In this role, a sign is forced to obey the ruling and relevant natural laws and empowered to take on a dynamics all its own.

In the contention between signs and objects, the answer initially given by the pragmatic theory of signs is that anything can potentially serve in any role of a sign relation.  In particular, the distinction between sign and object is a ''pragmatic'' distinction, a mark of use, not an ''essential'' distinction, a mark of substance.  This is the right answer as far as the beginning of the question goes, where it is the possible character of everything that is at issue.  The pragmatic approach makes it possible to begin an investigation that would otherwise be obstructed by a futile search for non existent essentials, as if it were necessary to divine them from prior considerations before any experience has been ventured and before a bit of empirical evidence has been collected.

In the contention between signs and objects, the answer initially given by the pragmatic theory of signs is that anything can potentially serve in any role of a sign relation.  In particular, the distinction between sign and object is a ''pragmatic'' distinction, a mark of use, not an ''essential'' distinction, a mark of substance.  This is the right answer as far as the beginning of the question goes, where it is the possible character of everything that is at issue.  The pragmatic approach makes it possible to begin an investigation that would otherwise be obstructed by a futile search for non-existent essentials, as if it were necessary to divine them from prior considerations before any experience has been ventured and before a bit of empirical evidence has been collected.

<pre>

Reason alone teaches us to know good and evil.  Therefore conscience, which makes us love the one and hate the other, though it is independent of reason, cannot develop without it.

Rousseau, Emile

<p>Reason alone teaches us to know good and evil.  Therefore conscience, which makes us love the one and hate the other, though it is independent of reason, cannot develop without it.</p>

| align="right" | Rousseau, ''Emile, or On Education''

But the form of answer that is sufficient to begin a study is not the form of answer that is necessary to end it.  Even though it is useful for a general theory of signs to provide a patently indifferent form of answer at the preliminary phases of its investigation, this style of response is ultimately judged to be facile when it comes to questions about the good of a sign, the end of an inquiry, or the suitability of each thing to the role it is assigned.  In the end, an all purpose brand of conceptual scheme, allowing for the equipotential coverage of every conceivable option, however useful or necessary to the task, is likely to be found insufficient for wrapping up these goods and delivering them into the service of the mind.  Thus, by the round about way of this objection, one brings to mind the other meaning, the underlying nuance and the ultimate sense, of the word "object", which suggests the end, the goal, or the good of something.

But the form of answer that is sufficient to begin a study is not the form of answer that is necessary to end it.  Even though it is useful for a general theory of signs to provide a patently indifferent form of answer at the preliminary phases of its investigation, this style of response is ultimately judged to be facile when it comes to questions about the good of a sign, the end of an inquiry, or the suitability of each thing to the role it is assigned.  In the end, an all purpose brand of conceptual scheme, allowing for the equipotential coverage of every conceivable option, however useful or necessary to the task, is likely to be found insufficient for wrapping up these goods and delivering them into the service of the mind.  Thus, by the round about way of this objection, one brings to mind the other meaning, the underlying nuance and the ultimate sense, of the word ''object'', which suggests the end, the goal, or the good of something.

Questions about the good of something, and what must be done to get it, and what shows the way to do it, belong to the "normative sciences" of aesthetics, ethics, and logic, respectively.  Aesthetic knowledge is a creature's most basic sense of what is good or bad for it, as signaled by the experiential features of pleasure or pain, respectively.  Ethical knowledge deals with the courses of action and patterns of conduct that lead to these ends.  Logical knowledge begins from the remoter signs of what actions are true and false to their ends, and derives the necessary consequences indicated by combinations of signs.

Questions about the good of something, and what must be done to get it, and what shows the way to do it, belong to the ''normative sciences'' of aesthetics, ethics, and logic, respectively.  Aesthetic knowledge is a creature's most basic sense of what is good or bad for it, as signaled by the experiential features of pleasure or pain, respectively.  Ethical knowledge deals with the courses of action and patterns of conduct that lead to these ends.  Logical knowledge begins from the remoter signs of what actions are true and false to their ends, and derives the necessary consequences indicated by combinations of signs.

In pragmatic thought, the normative disciplines can be imagined as three concentric cylinders resting on their bases, increasing in height as they narrow, from aesthetics to ethics to logic, in that order.  Considered with regard to the plane of their experiential bases, logic is subsumed by ethics, which is subsumed by aesthetics.  And yet, in another sense, logic affords a perspective on ethics, while ethics affords a perspective on aesthetics.

In pragmatic thought, the normative disciplines can be imagined as three concentric cylinders resting on their bases, increasing in height as they narrow, from aesthetics to ethics to logic, in that order.  Considered with regard to the plane of their experiential bases, logic is subsumed by ethics, which is subsumed by aesthetics.  And yet, in another sense, logic affords a perspective on ethics, while ethics affords a perspective on aesthetics.

Because a sign, so far as it can tell in the time it passes, addresses an unknown future interpretant, that is, an indefinite futurity of potential responses, there is always an aspect of dialogue about the sign relation, especially insofar as it is subject to extension.  This is true no matter who, whether self or other, is ostensibly addressed by the sign or text at issue, and never mind what the chances are of a literal return in the communication.  In this regard, it is recognizance enough for a sign to be issued or a text to be written in anticipation of its future result.  And though it is never certain, it is always possible that the author of a text partially anticipates the use that others make of what is signed.

Because a sign, so far as it can tell in the time it passes, addresses an unknown future interpretant, that is, an indefinite futurity of potential responses, there is always an aspect of dialogue about the sign relation, especially insofar as it is subject to extension.  This is true no matter who, whether self or other, is ostensibly addressed by the sign or text at issue, and never mind what the chances are of a literal return in the communication.  In this regard, it is recognizance enough for a sign to be issued or a text to be written in anticipation of its future result.  And though it is never certain, it is always possible that the author of a text partially anticipates the use that others make of what is signed.

It is one of the rules of my system of general harmony, that the present is big with the future, and that he who sees all sees in that which is that which shall be.

It is one of the rules of my system of general harmony, that the present is big with the future, and that he who sees all sees in that which is that which shall be.

G.W. Leibniz, Theodicy, paragraph 360

G.W. Leibniz, Theodicy, paragraph 360