09/11/23

Looking at Appendix 2 in Brian Kemple’s Book (2019) “The Intersection” (Part 14 of 18)

0134 The English word, “education”, arises from two Latin terms, meaning “to train” and “to lead out”.

Perhaps, German is superior to English in simultaneously evoking more than one kernel in a single word.  In German, word-elements concatenate effortlessly.  There could be a German word for “the relation of arbitrariness between langueand parole” or for “the impossibility of phenomena fully objectifying their noumenon“.

0135 Does German-speaking Martin Heidegger hold an advantage?

Maybe, maybe not.  After all, he could not concatenate das Sein (Being) and des Seienden (beings).  Oh, what am I saying?  That is what he did, more or less.  So, when I place Heidegger’s not-fully melded concatenation against what isfor science, I get the following juxtaposition.

Figure 38

0136 How curious.

Am I suggesting that Heidegger’s phrase, das Sein des Seienden (the Being of beings), conceals a contiguity, and that contiguity is the same as the one that applies to all scientific things?

0137 Recall, the noumenon is the thing itself.  Its phenomena are its observable and measurable facets.  Plus, according to Kant’s slogan, a noumenon cannot be fully objectified as its phenomena.  This applies to all things in the natural sciences.  Empirio-schematic inquiry observes and measures phenomena.  Their noumenon is ignored.

By juxtaposition, das Sein is Being itself.  Des Seienden are beings that we encounter in our daily lives.  Plus, according to the implicit contiguity between these two real elements, Being cannot be fully objectified as beings that we encounter in our daily lives.  This applies to all modern things.

0138 Plus, as discussed in the prior blog, during the early 20th century, hylomorphic structures that juxtapose with ‘what is’ in the Positivist’s judgment seem to be in style.  The ground-breaking linguist, Ferdinand de Saussure, comes up with a similar structure, allowing me to say the following.

By juxtaposition, langue is language itself.  Parole are spoken words that we encounter in our daily lives.  Plus, according to the arbitrary relation between langue and parole, language cannot be fully objectified by speech acts.  This applies to everything we say. 

0139 What does this imply?

That is a good question.

09/8/23

Looking at Appendix 2 in Brian Kemple’s Book (2019) “The Intersection” (Part 15 of 18)

0140 What is the meaning, presence and message underlying a spoken word?

That is the question addressed in Razie Mah’s masterwork, How To Define The Word “Religion”, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.

0106 The category-based nested form allows an answer.  The normal context of definition3 brings the actuality of a spoken word2 into relation with the potentials of meaning, presence and message1

0141 How does this answer apply to the topic at hand?

To me, Martin Heidegger (and Charles Peirce, for that matter) wrestle with meaning.   Social construction corresponds to the meaning underlying the word, “religion”.  Social construction is what happens when one encounters a thing or event that does not make sense.  A social construction2c is a perspective-level reference2c constructed on a content-level reference2a.

0142 In addition to How to Define, the following three-level interscope is developed in Comments on Religious Experience (1985) by Wayne Proudfoot.

I start with a content-level category-based nested form.  The normal context of what is happening3a brings the actuality of a real encounter2a into relation with the possibilities inherent in ‘something’ happening1a.

Such an encounter would be processed on the situation level within the normal context of sensible construction3b.  But, what if sensible construction3b fails?  Then the failure of sensible construction3b brings the actuality that the experience cannot be situated2b into relation with the potential of situating the content-level encounter1b.

0143 When sensible construction fails, most people freak out, but not Kant or Peirce or Heidegger or Saussure or other brave souls who wrestle with meaning.  They ask themselves, “What makes sense?”, where “sense” means “a recovery from a lack of composure in the face of something that is not experienced as sensible”.

On the perspective level, the normal context of what makes sense3c brings the actuality of a social construction2c into relation with the potential of contextualizing the unsettling situation1c.

0144 Thus, I arrive at a three-level interscope that touches base with the hylomorphic structures introduced earlier in this examination of appendix 2 of Kemple’s book.

Figure 39

The virtual nested form in the realm of actuality contracts into the following hylomorphe.

Figure 40

A key feature of this hylomorphic structure is that the contiguity contains a negation.

0145 So far, so good.

The three-level interscope depicted above describes what Schleiermacher realizes (around 1800 AD) and what Proudfoot tries to dismantle (186 years later) in his rebuttal, entitled Religious Experience.

But, I wonder.

Is Proudfoot arguing against the interscope or the contracted hylomorphic slogan?

Plus… is there a label for a transition from a three-level interscope to a corresponding hylomorphe?

Consolidation?  Reduction?  Reification?

0146 Does the same whatever this transition is called apply to the slogan attributed to Immanuel Kant (who also wrote around 1800 AD)?

Kant reflects upon the mechanical revolution and the expansion of science.  The revolution starts rolling with the mechanical philosophers of the 1600s.  The roll is undeniable with mechanization, starting in the 1700s.

Plus, how about those crazy political revolutions in the late 1700s?

Western civilization embraces the empirio-schematic judgment.  This judgment contains three elements: well-defined specialized terms, mathematical and mechanical models, and observations and measurements of phenomena.   So, everyone (that is, those enjoying the pretensions of science) focuses on phenomena.

0147 But, phenomena alone cannot account for the thing that is being studied!

Kant (more or less) points out that a noumenon (the thing itself) cannot be fully accounted for by its phenomena (that is, the thing’s observable and measurable facets).

0148 Here is a picture of Kant’s insight within the format of this three-level interscope.

Figure 41

0149 Now, over time, this insight, which consists of perspective-level, situation-level and content-level actualities, is taken for more and more for granted.  A slogan appears. The slogan expresses a hylomorphic structure, so it is seems like a thing.  But, it is not a thing.  What is it?  A contraction?  An idea?  Maybe I can call it an “idealism”.  

Figure 42

0150 The slogan goes like this, “A noumenon [cannot be objectified as] its phenomena.”

The slogan has the character of a hylomorphic thing that should belong to secondness.  But, the positivist intellect regards it as what is and imbues it with firstness.  What does the positivist intellect regard as what ought to be and imbue with the category of secondness?  What ought to be is the empirio-schematic judgment, where a disciplinary language (relation) brings mathematical and mechanical models (what ought to be) into relation with observations and measurements (what is).

09/7/23

Looking at Appendix 2 in Brian Kemple’s Book (2019) “The Intersection” (Part 16 of 18)

0151 After a century, Kant’s insights are reified into a slogan.

Figure 43

0152 At this time, Peirce considers the nature of sign-relations.  The story is told in A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction (by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues).  Peirce knows that Kant’s categories are considered necessary for science, but he cannot situate Kant’s categories using his understanding of sign-relations.

So, Peirce’s social construction follows the same pattern.

Figure 44

0155 Heidegger walks on stage around three decades later. At the time, only a few academics are familiar with Peirce’s (re)discovery of the causality inherent in signs and his proposal of three categories of existence.

0156 Heidegger starts as a student of philosophy.  During this time, he reads a book on speculative grammar by the medieval scholastic, Scotus.  But, the treatise is only attributed to Scotus. The real author is Thomas of Erfurt. 

Then, Heidegger becomes a student of Husserl.  Husserl’s phenomenology wrestles with the nature of science.   Husserl proposes phenomenology (which is named after phenomena) in order to return to the noumenon, the thing itself, because science was on the verge of fixating on phenomena to the exclusion of its noumenon.

0157 I suppose that Heidegger realizes that what Husserl is dealing with (the Positivist’s judgment) does not extend to what Scotus (er… Thomas of Erfurt) discusses with his speculative grammar.

Eventually, Heidegger produces a social construction that bears the imprint of the hylomorphic structure that Husserl wrestles with.

Figure 45
09/6/23

Looking at Appendix 2 in Brian Kemple’s Book (2019) “The Intersection” (Part 17 of 18)

0158 So, how do these comments apply to what Kemple writes about language?

Okay, I plead “guilty”.

Perhaps, there is no application.

0159 Oh, I have an excuse.

I got distracted by the normal context of definition3 bringing the actuality of a spoken word2 into relation with the potential of meaning, presence and message1.

Then, I realized that Saussure’s definition of spoken language, as an arbitrary relation between two systems of differences, parole and langue, can be expressed with the same hylomorphic structure as ‘what is’ for the positivist intellect.  So does Heidegger’s das Sein des Seienden.

Then, I connected this hylomorphic structure to the actualities native to social construction.

0160 So why am I so easily distracted?

Surely, speech-alone talk is at the crux of the intersection between Peirce and Heidegger.

Why do I say, “speech-alone talk”, instead of “language”?

Perhaps, there is another story to be told.

See An Archaeology of the Fall, by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.

Our current Lebenswelt is not the same as the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

09/5/23

Looking at Appendix 3 in Brian Kemple’s Book (2019) “The Intersection” (Part 18 of 18)

0161 What about Appendix 3, titled “Synechism and semiosis”?

0162 Well, I best look into Appendix 4, which presents a helpful list of definitions.

“Synechism” is a principle of continuity.  There are no hard and fast distinctions between possibilities, because firstness is monadic.  In the empirio-schematic judgment, the dyad, a noumenon [cannot be objectified as] its phenomena, exists in the realm of possibility and obeys this principle.  There are no phenomena without their noumenon.  There is no noumenon without its phenomena.  The hazards of synechism are yet to be deeply appreciated.  For scientific inquiry, what happens when certain actors claim to be observing the phenomena of a noumenon which is not… um… obvious to other people?

“Tychism” is a corollary of synechism.  Peirce envisions chance (er… possibility) as universal.  Without possibility, there is no actuality or normal context.  If there is an actuality that appears out of nowhere, in such a fashion that it has no normal context, then we are back to phenomena of a noumenon which is not… um… subject to understanding.

“Semiosis” is the action of signs.  Signs are triadic relations.  Triadic relations constitute the human niche.

0163 For the Lebenswelt that we evolved in, our ancestors adapt to an ultimate niche as well as many proximate niches.  This means that hominin evolution is both convergent, with respect to our ultimate niche, and divergent, with respect to many proximate niches.  The ultimate niche is the potential of triadic relations.  The proximate niches are regional ecologies and environments.

Language evolves in the milieu of hand talk.  Hand talk relies on the semiotic qualities of icons and indexes to motivate a relation between parole (hand talk) and langue (mental processing).  As this motivated relation becomes more and more conventional (that is, habitual within hominin social circles), hand-talk gestures become more and more like signs in an arbitrary system of differences (that is, symbols).  Grammar consists of symbolic operations within a finite set of symbols.  By the time anatomically modern humans appear, hand talk is fully linguistic.

0164 Speech is added to hand talk with the appearance of our own species, Homo sapiens.

Humans practice hand-speech talk for around 200,000 years, with great success.

0165 Around 7,800 years ago, the end of the previous ice age raises sea-levels, flooding shallow geological basins such as what is now the Persian Gulf.  In the process, two hand-speech talking cultures, one settled on the basin and one settled along the coast and river gorge, are forced into proximity.  A pidgin and then a creole ensues.  The creole is the Sumerian language (unrelated to the nearby Semitic languages).  But, more importantly, this creole is the first instance of speech-alone talk.

At its inception, the Ubaid of southern Mesopotamia is the only culture in the world practicing speech-alone talk.

It is no coincidence that the world’s earliest civilization arises in southern Mesopotamia.

Speech-alone talk potentiates civilization.

0166 Our current Lebenswelt is marked by speech-alone talk.  Speech-alone talk spreads from the Ubaid to the four-corners of the world, potentiating unconstrained social complexity wherever it goes.

7800 years ago, the world population may have been as many as seven million.

Today, it is seven billion.

Such is the significance of the first singularity, the transition from hand-speech talk to speech-alone talk.

0167 Heidegger is a German philosopher who strives to restart Western philosophy after it fumbles its founding charisma.

Peirce is a precocious American post-modern who becomes fascinated with one of the crucial questions asked by scholastic philosophers, “What is the causality inherent to the sign-relation?”

0168 Both these philosophers propose ideas that address a single question, “What is the nature of our current Lebenswelt?”

Their answers apply to a single actuality.

0169 I do not know the name of this actuality, but I do appreciate the significance of Kemple’s attempt to delineate an intersection (without being aware that the term, “intersection”, might have a technical definition that supports his inquiry).

An intersection is an actuality composed of two actualities, each of which has its own nested form.

0170 For these reasons, Brian Kemple’s book, The Intersection of Semiotics and Phenomenology: Peirce and Heidegger in Dialogue, deserves interest.  While my examinations, so far, covering the term, “intersection”, and the appendices, are sparse, they are suggestive.  There is a lot at play within the pages of this book.

01/27/23

Looking at Daniel Estulin’s Book (2021) “2045 Global Projects at War” (Part 1 of 5)

0001 Daniel Estulin holds a notable resume.  He is a doctor of conceptual intelligence and a foreign policy advisor to sovereign states in Latin America and Eurasia.  He has authored many books, and hosted a Spanish language TV show on RT (formerly, Russia Today).  The subtitle of the book is “Tectonic Processes of Global Transformation”.

This look is a teaser for a more extensive examination, Comments on Daniel Estulin’s Book (2021) “2045 Global Projects At War”, by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.

0002 Estulin formulates the concept of global project and applies it to a number of civilizations, nations and international cabals.  His approach is intuitive and relies on his considerable experience and knowledge.  Estulin’s book is not structured in a manner that the reader learns a particular technique.  Consequently, the above-mentioned comments add value.  Perhaps, there is a method to Estulin’s approach.

0003 Certainly, the concept of global project is valuable, especially when applied, by Estulin, to the world in the present day.  Estulin is so well informed that he exercises the concept without trouble.  Does he want the rest of us to wield this tool without his years of experience, trials and reflection?

I don’t know.

0003 All I know is that humans tend to think in the ways of purely relational structures, often without realizing that fact.  So, I read Estulin’s text with two purely relational structures in mind, the Greimas square and the category-based nested form.

I start with a Greimas square and focus on the key word of “capitalism”.  A quick introduction to the Greimas square may be found in the other blog for this month (at www.raziemah.com for January 2023).

0004 Here is the result.

Figure 01

0005 The four elements are clarified by the following statements.

A is the focal term.  A is also the social head.  A goes with economics.

B contrasts with A.  B is also the social body.  B goes with politics.

C contradicts B and complements A.  C is capital.  Capital goes with information, intelligence and conspiracy system.  Anyone who gets an investment newsletter appreciates this.  The stuff of investment letters scale up when considering prices, markets and monetary policies.  C is what the social head fixates on.  C functions as a mind-independent being.  C is what the social head thinks about.

D contrasts with C, contradicts A and complements B.  D is communion.  Communion (D) is the object that brings us together.  Communion (D) is not a mind-independent being, even though it appears to be.  It (D) is mind-dependent, in the same way that a stomach and lungs are mind dependent.  We don’t just want to eat or breath.  We want to eat and breathe well.  Communion (D) is aesthetic, while economics (A), politics (B) and conspiracy system (C) are calculating.

11/10/22

Looking at Daryl Domning’s Book (2006) “Original Selfishness” (Part 9 of 16)

0053 What does Domning have to say about the evolution of self?

Chapter eight is called, “Evolution and human behavior”.

0054 Richard Dawkins writes a book, titled The Selfish Gene, where the organism is reduced to gene expression.  A living creature’s diverse features are really I-myselves of a self, composed of chromosomes (and its package, the cell).

Here, Dawkins projects the human term, “selfish”, which means, “to be preoccupied with one’s self”, onto an organism’s DNA, so that the organism itself is merely phenomena of a genetic noumenon.

Dawkin’s analogy is both counterintuitive and entertaining.  It gives rise to a competition to demonstrate one’s intellectual prowess by reading and discussing its quackery with other self-identified “public intellectuals”, thereby joining highly educated elites who disdain the morons who have no interest in such postmodern wizardry.

 0055 But hey, isn’t the term, “original selfishness”, also a projection?

Well, yes, imitation is the highest form of flattery.

0056 However, unlike the selfish gene, the selfish organism manifests psychological traits that express I, myself (A).   Thus, original selfishness (pre-A) can be explicitly defined and used as a model for behavioral traits.

So, Domning has that going for him.

0057 Of course, the problem is that the term, selfish (C), introduces a moral seed that blossoms when the adjective becomes the noun, selfishness (D).  Morals imply judgments.  Animals make judgments, but they do not make moral judgments.

Really, animals perform judgments.  Humans deliberate judgments.  Both make judgments.  But, the former does not dwell on the triadic structure of judgment.  The latter does.

0058 What exactly is a judgment?

A judgment is a triadic structure with three elements, relationwhat is, and what ought to be.  A judgment brings what ought to be into relation with what is.  When Peirce’s categories are assigned to each element, the judgment becomes actionable.  Otherwise, the judgment is contemplative.  An actionable judgment unfolds into a category-based nested form.

Here is a picture.

Figure 16
11/9/22

Looking at Daryl Domning’s Book (2006) “Original Selfishness” (Part 10 of 16)

0059 Now, I consider the simultaneous evolution of self (B) and cupid (B’).

According to the masterwork, The Human Niche, the Homo lineage adapts into the ultimate niche of triadic relations.

A judgment is a triadic relation.

A judgment brings what ought to be (category) into relation (category) with what is (category).

The categories are firstness, secondness and thirdness.  Firstness is the monadic realm of possibility.  Secondness is the dyadic realm of actuality.  Thirdness is the triadic realm of normal contexts, signs, mediations, judgments and so on.  When categories are assigned to each element, then a judgment becomes actionable.

For animals, a judgment leads to immediate action.  For hominins, a judgment may lead to immediate action.  A judgment may also create an actuality.  The element that is assigned to secondness becomes what is for further judgments.  This is the case for the evolution of self.

0060 Can I describe the transition from manifestations of I-myself in diverse situations (A) to self (B) as an adaptation into the niche of judgment as a triadic relation?

Yes, the associations are obvious.

Figure 17

0061 This particular judgment is an adaptation into the niche of triadic relations.

This particular judgment is innate and yields self (B) and cupid (B’) as actualities.

Remember, cupid (B’) is defined as the self among other selves.

The noun, self (B), proceeds to the adjective, selfish (C), where the self becomes the actuality that one obsesses over.The noun, cupid (B’), proceeds to the noun, concupiditas (C’), the desire of oneself to be with other selves, where cooperation with others becomes the actuality that one obsesses over.

07/22/22

Looking at Carlo Vigano’s Speech (2020) “How the Revolution of Vatican II Serves the New World Order” (Part 1 of 14)

0001 The presentation under consideration appears in a book, titled A Voice In the Wilderness: Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano On the Church, America, and the World, edited by Brian M. McCall and published in 2021 by Angelico Press, in Brooklyn NY.  The article is located at the end of Part II on pages 251 through 274.  It is a transcript of a speech given to the Catholic Identity Conference on October 24, 2020.  A video can be found on Remnant TV.

0002 The presentation is of interest as a follow-up to the June 2022 blog, Looking at Peter Redpath’s Essay (2000) “The Homeschool Renaissance”.   It complements the professional path taken by Dr. Redpath, who now promotes online courses, teaching “uncommon” common sense.

0003 Indeed, Vigano’s talk can only be described as “uncommon”, in the same way that Redpath’s essay, published 20 years earlier, is uncommon.  Plus, Vigano’s talk expresses common sense in the same way that Redpath’s essay does.

0004 Here is the difficulty.

How does one portray a turn of events that makes no sense?

0005 Redpath portrays the history of Italian humanists, who jettison logic at the very start of their movement, and who end up subjugated to the deterministic (and incomplete) logic of empirio-schematics.

Perhaps, the European humanists did not see it coming.

A little mathematical and mechanical logic can overthrow no logic at all.

0006 Vigano fixes on the political stagehands behind the theatrics of Vatican II, who embed themselves in the matrix of positional authority in the traditional Church as the drama of the Novus Ordo unfolds into a lurid parody of historic Catholicism.

Perhaps, the participants of the Council of Vatican II did not see it coming.

A little political intrigue can overthrow the realm.

0007 No, it does not make sense.

0008 How can one make something that does not make sense make sense? 

Obviously, the word, “sense”, has two implications.  The first implication is that it is sensible.  The second implication is that it impacts our five senses.  That is, it is sensical.  Sensible is not the same as sensical.

Something that does not make sense is not sensible.

Something that one cannot see, hear, taste, smell and touch is not sensical.

0009 Here is the trick.

Through diagrams of triadic relations, something that is not sensible may become sensical.

0009 So, my examination transforms into a question, asking, “How can I associate features of Vigano’s argument to empty slots in purely relational triadic structures, such as the category-based nested form?”

That is my task.

0010 The following blogs rely on the three works listed below.  Each displays the synthetic process of association and implication.  Once I associate features of Vigano’s speech to elements in a category-based nested form, I consider the implications.

0011 The three works are available at smashwords and other e-book venues.  Search for the author, Razie Mah, along with the title.

A Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form

A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction

How to Define the Word “Religion”

0012 Vigano’s presentation breaks into eleven sections.  Each is covered by a blog.  Then, a conclusion suggests other applications of Charles Peirce’s synthetic logic.

07/21/22

Looking at Carlo Vigano’s Speech (2021) “How the Revolution of Vatican II Serves the New World Order” (Part 2 of 14)

0013 Section one starts boldly.

We live in extraordinary times.  The norms of the integralists do not apply.

0014 Who are the integralists?

They are the ones who expect ritual and doctrinal continuity through time.

According to their antagonists, integralists conflate material continuity and tradition, as if a change in form coincides with a change in matter.

What primitive cogitations!

“Integralist” is a pejorative term among Bergoglio’s party.

0015 How do I associate Vigano’s opening with a nested form?

The integralist is a person who expects the hylomorphic realness of the Catholic Church to remain unaltered through time.

0016 What is a hylomorphe?

A hylomorphe is an actuality that has the structure of matter [substance] form.  A hylomorphe corresponds to Peirce’s category of secondness.  Secondness consists of two contiguous real elements.  The nomenclature is one real element [contiguity] other real element.

0017 So, what type of hylomorphe does the Catholic Church manifest?

Here is my guess.

Figure 01

0018 Surely, other associations may work just as well.

0019 The integralist holds that the hylomorphe, body of Christ [substance] kingdom of God is an actuality2.  Body of Christ is like matter.  Kingdom of God parallels form.  The contiguity, labeled “substance”, reflects the potential1underlying this actuality.  For now, I will call this potential1, “the third person of the Trinity1“.  Later, I will call this potential, “the charism of Christ1“.

The normal context3 is the Catholic Church3, an institution that has weathered many centuries, and still, somehow, remains afloat.

0020 Here is the integralist’s nested form.

Figure 02