SIGNS IN SOCIETY - STIBA Malang

16 I Foundations of Peircean Semiotics Peirce Divested for Nonintimates I 17
Adopting as his maxim, "The function of reason is to trace out in the real work
analogues of logical relations" (MS 278[a]:9), Peirce investigates the nature o
semiotic relations in both naturally occurring and artificially constructed for
and he argues that "the preference among different forms of signs should
given that one which is most easily examined, manipulated, preserved, and anatj
omized" (MS 637:30). On these criteria, particular natural languages presei
obvious difficulties (noted above), and human language in general seems to be
poor model: spoken language is spoiled by showing disparate significances of il
forms in different contexts and having systemic ambiguities in its constituen
hierarchies, and written language as well is too "encumbered with sensuous acj
cessories" (NEM 3/1:270) to be useful to the logician. Even when language if
revealing it is so to the degree that specific formal characteristics are ignored:
A sign . . . perfectly conforms to the definition of a medium of communication.
It is determined by the object, but in no other respect than goes to enable it to
act upon the interpreting quasi-mind [the interprétant] ; . . . other than that of
determining it as if the object itself had acted upon it. Thus, after an ordinary I
conversation, a wonderfully perfect kind of sign-functioning, one knows whatf
information or suggestion has been conveyed, but will be utterly unable to say j
in what words it was conveyed, and often will think it was conveyed in words, \
when if fact it was only conveyed in tones or in facial expressions. (MS
283:130-31)
What is called for is a system of signs which transparently convey the determii
nation of their objects to their interprétants. If the primary function of signs i'
to be a "medium of communication," they fulfill that function more perfectly it
(1) qualisigns, qualities or Firsts that are signs,
(2) sinsigns, existent objects or events, Seconds, that are signs, and
(3) legisigns, general laws or regularities, Thirds, that are signs.
SYMBOL
INDEX
ICON
QUALISIGN SINSIGN
Figure f.z. The three trichotomies
LEGISIGN
But signs can also be considered in terms of their relations to their objects, in
other words, in terms of their respective grounds. On this criterion, Peirce also
distinguishes
(1) icons, signs whose grounds involve formal resemblance,
(2) indices, signs whose grounds involve actual connection, and
(3) symbols, signs whose grounds involve conventional associations.
Finally, signs can be viewed in terms of how they are represented in their interprétants:
the interprétant is determined to represent the complex semiotic object as if thf
(1) rhemes are signs whose interprétants represent them as being icons,
mediating forms of representation were not there at all. Peirce does believe, howl
(2) dicents are signs whose interprétants represent them as being indices, and
ever, that the "garment of expression" (NEM 3/1:406) can never be Completel]!
(3) arguments are signs whose interprétants represent them to be symbols.
removed revealing "naked thought itself," since that would imply the collapse oj
fully triadic semiotic relationships: "The meaning of a representation can bj Each of these sets of triple divisions Peirce calls a "trichotomy" (see Savan 1987—
nothing but a representation. In fact, it is nothing but the representation itsel| 88). And these three trichotomies intersect in interesting ways so that not all
conceived as stripped of irrelevant clothing. But this clothing never can be coi
twenty-seven possible combinations are realized semiotically. In fact, Peirce
pletely stripped off; it is only changed for something more diaphanous" (Cl
claims that the logical interaction of the three trichotomies yields only ten signs
1-339)-
(CP 2.254—64), as shown in Figure 1.2.
Since symbols require interprétants to provide their grounds, they must be
The Trichotomies
Peirce's distinctions among kinds of signs can be summarized by returnin
to the elementary model of semiotic relations: a sign stands for an object in som
respect to some interprétant. If signs are analyzed in themselves as they belon
to one of Peirce's three degrees of reality (Firstness, Secondness, Thirdness), on
can distinguish
legisigns; so six possibilities on the top row are automatically eliminated. Similarly,
since Firsts cannot have any degree of internal complexity, they cannot be
indices or symbols; so six possibilities are eliminated from the left column. Peirce
claims, further, that a sign cannot determine an interprétant to represent it as
having a more complex ground than it actually has. Thus, an icon cannot be
apprehended semiotically as an index or as a symbol; that is, an icon cannot be
a dicent or an argument (thus blocking out six additional possibilités in the bottom
row). Similarly, an index cannot be apperceived as a symbol; that is, an