Talk:Charles Sanders Peirce/Archive 3

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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

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)

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)

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)

"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)

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)

Franks Valli Has Born False Witness

• And dat's da truth. Created Equal 03:12, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

• 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)

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)

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)

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)

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)

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)

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)

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)

Why is it edit-protected again? Did a sock puppet reappear? DCDuring 14:08, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

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)

Donated Books

Books on Logic that belonged to Peirce were sold or donated by his widow. They are in the library at Harvard and can be downloaded at http://www.books.google.com/ Lestrade 00:45, 27 April 2007 (UTC)Lestrade

Mathematics

I have not had a chance to read through the whole of Peirce's article and the discussions, and the Archives — so it may be that some of these issues have already been brought up. Anyhow, as a Mathematician/Scientist (mathematical scientist, actually), I have some commonsensical questions in regards to Peirce's article :

1. Why is there no criticism of his work or of him? I do not believe that, given the length of the article, there is a single criticism of him. Are fellow wikipedians to believe that he was (assuming the date of death to be correct) perfect?
2. In the section concerning his contributions to mathematics, there is a distinct lack of mathematical symbolism. This, in and of itself, is not a problem — but it does point to the very likely fact that he practiced mathematics that is very much different and at odds with the mathematical work of current modern day mathematicians. In the section concerning Logical graphs, there is also a lack of symbolism. Of course, this is all dependent upon how one defines mathematics. However, it does seem surprising that Peirce did not have a chance to outline how his work might be equivalent to any mathematical languages that mathematicians take for granted nowadays (such as ZFC, and other commonly studied, read and acknowledge mathematical formalisms).
3. How many mathematical syllabuses nationally and internationally contain Pierce's work within their itinerary? How many syllabuses set questions on Pierce's logical graphs on their exam papers? I cannot imagine many. ConcernedScientist 01:01, 5 June 2007 (UTC)

Dear ConcernedScientist, I share many of the concerns that you have expressed above. In order to understand the current state of any wikitext, whether in Wikipedia or Elsewhere, one has to understand a couple of factors : (α) the features that are peculiar to the specific wiki environment and (β) the full contribution history of the text in question. In the case of the English Wikipedia article on Charles Sanders Peirce : (α) many of the defects that you mention are due to philosophical and populational peculiarities of the English Wikipedia environment and (β) many more are due to the rather troubled history of this particular article. As often happens, these two factors have conspired to block any easy remedy of the rather obvious defects you mention. I will fill in some details of the case as I get time. Voice Of Xperience 14:44, 10 June 2007 (UTC)

Goudge

{{editprotected}} Minor edit, please. In 'Reception', could an admin link the mention of Thomas Goudge to the new article T.A. Goudge, please? Thanks! Homagetocatalonia 16:02, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Done. Cheers. --MZMcBride 16:17, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

Logic portal link

{{editprotected}} Perhaps when the controversy dies down I (or someone else) could place this link to the logic portal? {{portal|Logic}} (Forget about that other template I guess.) Gregbard 04:42, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

Boolean algebra is now a disambiguation page

As soon as this page is unprotected, someone should disambiguate the link to "Boolean algebra" to Boolean algebra (logic), which is the correct target here. --Trovatore 19:39, 20 July 2007 (UTC)

Done. In future using {{editprotected}} would help draw attention to such requests. —David Eppstein 19:06, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

"Purse"

Please change to IPA. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nekrorider (talk • contribs)

{{editprotected}}

N Declined. Please be clearer about what edit you propose. Sandstein 05:46, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Add a disambiguation header

Could someone add a header like {{distinguish|Charles Pierce}} to make

Not to be confused with Charles Pierce.

Charles Pierce has a similar line that points to this page. Lisatwo 03:21, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

{{editprotected}} Lisatwo 03:22, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

Done. Cheers. --MZMcBride 22:45, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

A persistent problem

A fundamental problem continues to haunt this entry and its Talk Page: too much of it reflects the highly idiosyncratic point of view of a certain Jon Awbrey, who is not a Peirce scholar and whose views bear little resemblance to the Peirce scholarship found in university libraries. I applaud any action taken by Wikipedia management to limit the influence Awbrey has on this and related entries.

Thanks to Brent's biography, the facts of Peirce's life are reasonably well established. However, the sheer mass and range of Peirce's writings remains daunting as ever. Sorting out what Peirce thought remains up in the air, if only because the Collected Papers are misleading in some important respects, and the IUP chronological edition is complete only through 1890. After more than 30 years of work, only 6 of a planned 31 volumes of that edition have appeared, none since 2000. Secondary studies, such as Goudge 1950 and Murphey 1961, that were landmarks in their day are now obsolescent. Since then, our understanding of related figures such as Royce, C I Lewis, Dewey, and C K Ogden has advanced considerably. Hence the whole subject of Peirce's "influence" has to be revisited.

As for Peirce and Leibniz, Max Fisch wrote an entire essay (republished in Fisch 1986) on the relation between the two, quoting Peirce who was well aware of the parallels. Hence a mention of these parallels in this entry, citing Fisch, is not out of place. Some mention of Frege is also in order because Peircians complain, with justice I maintain, that Frege has hogged much of the intellectual limelight that is rightly Peirce's. Frege leads to analytic philosophy and the tortured mathematics of PM; Peirce points us towards Boolean algebra, and set and model theory.132.181.160.42 06:33, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Repair three links

The following links under "References" on the main page need to be corrected as shown just below, because of the move of the Arisbe website from members.door.net to the cspeirce.com domain. (The links are already correct on the Peirce bibliography page(s) Charles Sanders Peirce bibliography and Charles Sanders Peirce (Bibliography).)

Links (under "References") with the corrected URLs:

Anellis, I.H. (1995) "Peirce Rustled, Russell Pierced: How Charles Peirce and Bertrand Russell Viewed Each Other's Work in Logic, and an Assessment of Russell's Accuracy and Role in the Historiography of Logic," Modern Logic 5: 270–328.

Houser, Nathan (1989) "The Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Peirce Papers," Fourth Congress of the International Association for Semiotic Studies, Perpignan, France, 1989. Published, pp. 1259–1268 in Signs of Humanity, vol. 3, Michel Balat and Janice Deledalle-Rhodes (eds.), Gérard Deledalle (gen. ed.), Mouton de Gruyter, Berlin, Germany, 1992.

Peirce, C.S., "Application of C.S. Peirce to the Executive Committee of the Carnegie Institution, July 15, 1902." Published in Eisele, Carolyn, ed. (1976) "Parts of Carnegie Application (L75)" in The New Elements of Mathematics by Charles S. Peirce, Vol. 4, Mathematical Philosophy. The Hague, Netherlands: Mouton Publishers: 13–73.

The Tetrast 00:25, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

"editprotected" label fixed The Tetrast 00:41, 4 September 2007 (UTC)

"editprotected" label fixed and I hope I got it right this time. The Tetrast 14:01, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

I mean that the links, as I show them just above, contain the corrected URLs, somebody just needs to paste into place in the article. The Tetrast 13:40, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

Somebody, perhaps you, already corrected those links, but the corrections were lost in this instance of massive vandalism committed by administrator SlimVirgin when she reverted 3 months of worth of edits on the article. Graysnots 18:34, 5 September 2007 (UTC)

I think the references are fixed now, but I will double check. Name Sleightly Anonymized 20:25, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

They are fixed now. The use of "Eprint" and "PDF" labels at the end of the citation is done to maintain a distinction between the printed and the online versions, to warn of PDF files, and to avoid that little arrow from breaking into the middle of lines. 12.75.42.63 20:32, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you so much. I didn't know anything was going on with the "Eprint" and "PDF" labels, I though I was just replacing the URLs and leaving everything else the same. But I was wondering what was going on visually with the arrow thingy. I'll be alert to the issue next time. Thanks again. The Tetrast 02:17, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

I've reduced the protection on the article. If problems persist from a particular editor, let me know. Cheers. --MZMcBride 19:38, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Un-Protection Request

Why is it edit-protected again? Did a sock puppet reappear? DCDuring 14:08, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

The article should be unprotected now. Does anyone know the procedure for requesting that? There has never been any dispute that cannot be worked out in the usual way among the editors who care about the article and are familiar with its subject matter. Voice Of Xperience 15:46, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Request for Archiving Some of Talk Page

Some of the discussion has been rendered obsolete by subsequent changes. I would have to leave it to veterans to decide what of the older discussions still has a bearing and should not be archived. DCDuring 21:11, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

Archive Issue

I was trying to figure out how to make another Archive page, but when I did I discovered that somebody had already made an Archive_2 for Jan 2006 to Jun 2006, only somehow the link to it got omitted, so I will look at that and see if it's okay, then delete the corresponding sections here. Moses Nebogipfel 03:54, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

That's much better. Thank you. DCDuring 04:10, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Article Length

This article is huge. Would it not be possible to break out, say, Pierce's more strictly mathematical contributions? Inter-article links are so effective that IMHO little would be lost in those instances where someone had to switch back and forth a few times because of connections between the mathematics and the philosophy. DCDuring 21:11, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

It's a little long, but see data above about comparable thinkers. It has already been through several spin-off phases, and may be due for another. His maths and logic are tightly integrated, though, so care is needed. Saralee Arrowood Viognier 21:36, 6 September 2007 (UTC)

If I didn't think care was needed, I might have taken a run at it myself on the better-to-ask-forgiveness-than-permission principle (which seems especially appropriate with easy undo). I just don't know what the cleavage surfaces are in the edifice. There is nothing that says article length should be proportionate to influence. I am not interested in limiting the total size of Peirce-related articles, just the maximum size of the articles in the Peirce group of articles -- and anything else I might want to browse or edit. DCDuring 00:02, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Odd as it may seem, many people care more about doing the best job possible with a complex and difficult subject than they do about such incidentals as the byte count. Any one who reviews the history of the article over the last couple of years can see that the recurrent episodes of "shoot-first-ask-questions-later" have not done it much justice, not to mention all the human effort that got wasted bye the bye. Now, these concerns have been noted before by all hands on deck and I'm sure that most folks can see a lot of different areas for improvement — some of that work might squeeze out some bytes, but other types of work invariably tend to add more bytes. There are cycles to it, if you're in for the long haul. At any rate, since the article has been frozen with no progress whatever for many moons, I don't see much of a rush about it. I'm sure that those who are familiar with the subject are just itching to get back to work on it. Francisca Wartenberg 01:10, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

It is the definition of "best job" that is at issue -- to whatever limited extent we actually disagree in emphasis. I am counting on high-quality content. Many other articles I look at on WP are terrible; this one is very good, if a little dense for the likely audience -- and to get a FA rating. I just thought that we could also make users have a good experience in reading it and editors have a less tedious time editing it. DCDuring 02:05, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

The current state of the article is due to several factors, both benign and adverse. The more positive influences are due to the fact that several editors with several decades of combined experience in Peirce studies from different angles of approach were once collaborating on the article. Let's pass over the negative for now. All of the desirabilities that you mention have been discussed and addressed time and again, but it's an ongoing process, and the more time that folks spend repeating the obvious on the discussion page the less time they have to do the work required. There's a comment in one of the boxes upstairs that mentions how stubby some of the stub sections are — well, that's precisely because many whole sections have already been cleavered off to separate articles, and now it will take a few more bytes to dress up the "Main Article" links. So there are competing forces that push in opposite directions. Voice Of Xperience 03:08, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

If only old hands can play here, then I think it will turn out to be harder to achieve WP readability and intelligiblity goals. Having an overlong (64 headings!!!) talk page that may not reflect the current state of play is a barrier to participation by willing newbies, who probably aren't all vandals. DCDuring 03:37, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

This article is not necessarily "too long". Just that it should be shorter. There is some good in this article, and some good in the additions by readers, but, all-in-all, not much on Peirce's metaphysics, epistemology, or his view of theology. Here is a pretty good quote from Charles Sanders Peirce himself, on "belief": "The essence of beilef is the establishment of a habit, and different beliefs are distinguished by the different modes of action to which they give rise. If beliefs do not differ in this respect, if they appease the same doubt by producing the same rule of action, then no mere differences in the manner of consciousness of them can make them different beliefs, any more than playing a tune in different keys is playing different tunes. Imaginary distinctions are often drawn between beliefs which differ only in their mode of expression ..." [C.S. Peirce, "How to Make Our Ideas Clear", From: Popular Science Monthly, Volume 12, (January, 1878), pp. 286-302; quoted on page 144, in: White, Morton. (1955). The Mentor Philosophers. The Age of Analysis: Twentieth Century Philosophers. New York: Mentor Books, New American Library; q.v. ].Scott R. Harrington (talk) 05:28, 13 June 2008 (UTC)

Semeiotic, Semiotics, Theory of Signs

Note to Tetrast. I see from your user pages that you have been working on these topics. Some of the "missing grapes" vis-a-vis Peirce's theory of signs can be found in a number of other articles that were earlier spun off from this one. Many of these can be found listed in the "Main Article" link in various token sections — "token", ha ha — and others can be found in the "See Also" section, for instance, here:

• Charles_Peirce#Information, inquiry, logic, semiotics

• Semeiotic
• Semiosis
• Semiotics
• Semiology

• Sign
• Icon
• Index
• Symbol

The general confusion about Peirce's sem(e)iotic(s) versus Saussure's semiology is as bad as it ever was, but no one has had the energy, nerve, or time to try and do much about it yet. So there it is.

The Manual of Style seems to weigh against titles like "Sign (Peirce)", so the spin that a given thinker has on a topic tends to become a subsection of the article on that topic. The articles on Semeiotic and Semiotic Triangle are still very short, and may be natural places to elaborate Peirce's own take on the subject, complete with lots of pretty pictures. Der Mann Ohne Eigenschaften 12:08, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

They might be good places. But I've noticed articles with titles such as Category_(Kant), Physics_(Aristotle), and Celebrity_Jeopardy!_(Saturday_Night_Live), so that format seems allowed. The stuff that I'm preparing on kinds of signs is definitely about Peirce's system in particular, and not even about all of it, but just the "main" stuff. And it's not done yet -- I have to fix up the stuff about symbols. I'm going to take it slow and watch what happens to the main article. (No reversion wars for me, thanks; I'll make myself scarce if that happens.) Anyway, I don't have the free time that I used to have. The Tetrast 18:12, 8 September 2007 (UTC)

If anyone with the wherewithal is really up for a challenge — don't look at me — the page titled "Semiology" is currently just a redirect to Semiotics, but it could be converted into full-fledged article on Saussure's way of treating signs, sorting all that out from its current misplacements in Semiosis, Semiotics, and Sign. Just a thought. Der Mann Ohne Eigenschaften 12:28, 7 September 2007 (UTC)

Icon, index, symbol

Jossi wanted to briefen the definitions of icon, index, and symbol, that's okay. But the unexplained use of words like "representamen" and "ground" could only confuse the general reader and many a philosopher as well. The section on classes of signs is not the place to suddenly use Peirce's alternate term "representamen" in place of "sign." The ground is an important concept but it needs to be defined.The Tetrast 22:09, 9 September 2007 (UTC) Revised The Tetrast 23:18, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

"(e.g. fork on a sign by the road indicating a rest stop)" -- too complex an example of an icon, because the sign is also very indexical, "indicating" a rest stop as the examples says. The Tetrast 22:28, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

I've finally noticed that the whole subsection explaining sign, object, and interpretant is gone. Well, why keep icon, index, symbol, without object, sign, interpretant? The explanations of icon, index, and symbol depend on the reader's knowing what object, sign, and interpretant are.
Well, I won't get into a reversion war over this. It was just a bad move. When I finish working on the questions about symbols, I'll put the whole kit and kaboodle into a separate article.The Tetrast 22:57, 9 September 2007 (UTC)

Original research and POV-pushing

Please be aware that banned user Jon Awbrey (talk · contribs · deleted contribs · logs · filter log · block user · block log) has an obsessive interest int his article, and has used many ban-evading sockpuppets to attempt to force his original research into this article. See Category:Wikipedia sockpuppets of Jon Awbrey. The majority of arguments on this page appear to come from Awbrey socks. Guy (Help!) 22:02, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Guy, I've posted quite a few comments on this talk page, but am not Jon Awbrey. Visit my user page, where there are links to my activities elsewhere. I am ultimately contactable personally. If you're referring to my saying "When I finish working on the questions about symbols" -- I don't mean my own research on the nature of symbols, I mean my trying to nail down what Peirce's views were on certain aspects of symbols, basically by finding clear statements by Peirce on the subject. As I've said at my User Page, my actual name is Benjamin Udell, and you can find my posts to peirce-l here about the symbols issue which I had in mind, an issue which I'll probably not pursue too far in the article on Peirce's signs.The Tetrast 22:23, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

I see this morning that the reversion war was going on yesterday. I've repaired some links in the references, which got reverted to their earlier broken forms. Well that's all for me for the time being, now I'll wait till the dispute is resolved, though as far as I can tell, it won't be, so I have little hope for the article's remaining unprotected or for it's being worth it for me to set up a sub-article on Peirce's signs, which would probably end up suffering the same fate. It's most unfortunate. Peirce deserves better. Still, I thank the administrator(s) who decided to give the article a chance for work under reduced protection. The Tetrast 13:14, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Categories

The article seems quiet now, and I just couldn't resist trying an edit. The section on Peirce's Categories has needed editing. Maybe it should become a sub-article, but it seems a bit stub-like right now. Another consideration is that Peirce's categories really are totally central to his philosophy. The Tetrast 19:28, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

The asterisked note below the table contains the kind of info which a reader needs right away. The other footnotes which I added, footnotes which appear instead near the end of the article, are for helping people check stuff or pursue curiosity. The Tetrast 19:59, 13 September 2007 (UTC) Revised The Tetrast 20:00, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks again to the administrators for attempting to keep this article editable. That's part of why I went ahead and did this -- in order to try to do my part to help make it worth it.
Note also that the Theory of Categories section is now shorter than it was when I found it. The Tetrast 20:09, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

Big edit of sections on signs

"Types of signs" was always a bad section title because "type" is itself a word which Peirce used to label a certain class of signs (type = legisign = famisign). There is a new article Semiotic elements and classes of signs (Peirce) where the subject is discussed in more detail.
I added a section on "Semiotic elements" because the sign-object-interpretant triad is one of THE major topics in Peirce. More detail in Semiotic elements and classes of signs (Peirce). Yet, much important stuff remains in Sign relations, especially on correspondence, determination, comprehension, denotation, etc., much of which I don't cover at all and any I don't understand everything in that article very clearly.
I hope it's not terrible to give two "main articles" for a section. I didn't know what else to do.The Tetrast 20:38, 15 September 2007 (UTC) I changed my mind, no two main articles for a single section.The Tetrast 20:49, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Shortening the article as a whole remains a tough task ahead.The Tetrast 21:43, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Distinguishing Charleses

Leaving a link at the top to a man with the same name but with no other distinguishing identification is only moderately helpful and begs the question "Which Charles Pierce?". If someone is looking for a Charles Pierce because of some philosophical or scientific principal, but that someone is not sure whether it is this one, they might waste time clicking on the other Charles Pierce's link. I think it would be more helpful if they could see up front that the other one is known for being a female impersonator, so they know if it's a scientific issue, they are in the right place. -- But|seriously|folks  17:55, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Seems like a very sensible idea, BSF. Thank you. ... Kenosis 18:05, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. Too bad I don't know how to spell "Peirce"! -- But|seriously|folks  18:29, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Very funny, but this goes against standard practice, which leaves it to the target of the link to provide the additional details that are distracting in the present context. Ziemia Cieszynska 01:12, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I believe standard practice is to state why the other individual is notable. Look at Charles Pierce, for example, or Wesley Clark, Douglas Adams or Samuel Beckett (the last three being featured articles). -- But|seriously|folks  01:37, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

See the following usage notes:

• Wikipedia:Disambiguation
• Wikipedia:Disambiguation#Usage_guidelines
• Wikipedia:Hatnotes

The guiding question to ask oneself is this: If a person types "Charles Peirce" into the Wikipedia search box, do they get what they expect or not? On that basis, there is actually no call for any "disambiguation link" at the top of the page. If a person is looking for a philosopher and types the mispelling "Charles Pierce" into the search box, then they will probably be surprised and no doubt amused, so there is a reason to put a disambiguation link on that page. Ziemia Cieszynska 02:06, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

And if they're looking for the famous female impersonator? --Haemo 02:16, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

If they're looking for the famous (a relative term) female impersonator, it's quite unlikely that they'll mistype "Peirce" for the "Pierce" which would have been correct. "Pierce" is a common name, "Peirce" is a bit unusual. And they'll quickly see that they have the wrong one and they'll see "not to be confused with Charles Pierce" and click on that name. The Tetrast 02:21, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I see that Ziemia completely removed the disambiguation link. Previously Ziemia removed only the part about "female impersonator" and I was okay with the link in minimal form. I thought hanging the phrase "female impersonator" near Peirce's head was meant as a joke but I see that Butseriouslyfolks is a serious editor/administrator. Still, the phrase "female impersonator" is distractingly undignified in the context. That's my motive for agreeing with Ziemia, but she also has presented a good justification. The Tetrast 02:32, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

For what it's worth, I agree with Ziemia. The Tetrast 02:13, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

How about the people who can't get the "i before e" thing straight? Like this million people. Or this million people? It even took me a while to notice the difference in spelling between the Charleses, and I can spel wel. -- But|seriously|folks  02:34, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Oh pleeease just put "Not to be confused with Charles Pierce" and let the "female imperonator" stuff go. I won't fight a reversion war over it but please please. The Tetrast 02:38, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I believe the phrase is "i before e expect after c" not "i before e except when you're looking for the famous female impersonator". --Haemo 02:39, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Can I ask what is so objectionable about the dab that we should break from established practice as shown above? -- But|seriously|folks  02:52, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't concede that you have the argument over Ziemia in terms of practice or rules. But what's objectionable about "female impersonator" is that it is distractingly undignified in the context and, if it weren't, then it wouldn't be funny. If you don't think it's funny, say so to Tony Curtis and Dustin Hoffman. I rest my case, for the moment. The Tetrast 03:13, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

So if the other Charles was just a musician or actor, you wouldn't take issue with it? It's a valid Wikipedia article, just like any other. (I guess it's a good thing Peirce wasn't named Ron Jeremy!) Seriously, I really think we're doing people a disservice and encouraging forks if we don't do everything we can to help them find what they're looking for. -- But|seriously|folks  03:26, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

The logic of the above guideline is clear. The Wesley Clark et al. examples are not comparable because there the spellings are the same. This means that a person typing "Wesley Clark" into the search box while looking for one of the other WC's needs to be advised. There is no need for a reader advisory here, much less an excessively prolix one. Ziemia Cieszynska 03:32, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

In addition, the hatnote on the Wesley Clark article is in bad form for the following two reasons: (1) there are potentially a very large number of notables with the same first and last name, not all which should be listed at the top of every comparable article, and (2) one of those listed is a red link. The hatnote should be succinct and refer the reader to a disambiguation page where the variants can be listed in full. Ziemia Cieszynska 03:38, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Ziemia is right and succinct, as usual. Anyway, yes, I wouldn't have taken issue with it if the other Charles were just a musician or actor. I don't think one does more than a very minimal disservice to Wikipedia reader if we leave off mention of "female impersonator" from "Not to be confused with Charles Pierce" which would be quite enough. De minimis. And there is in fact no need to rigorously maximize and extremize a particular kind of benefit to Wikipedia readers in every single case, especially when there is a countervailing concern, in the present case that of not including a distractingly undignified thing. And I have to go to sleep, good night, all! The Tetrast 03:42, 17 September 2007 (UTC) And yes, why one cares and what rules one invokes don't always have to be the same, they legitimately differ often enough in real life. The Tetrast 03:45, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think Ziemia is Jon

I notice that Ziemia has been banned as one of Jon's suspected sockpuppets. But there's no pun in Ziemia's name like Jon's sockpuppet names usually have. Ziemia's behavior has not been like Jon's. Ziemia reverted once or twice but that's not the same thing as what Jon does, and Ziemia was not involved in today's back-&-forth. I've looked at Ziemia's user page; it doesn't look like Jon's sockpuppet user pages, and Ziemia's contribution history doesn't look like Jon's sort of thing. And, most noticeably, Ziemia's comments don't sound like Jon at all. Ziemia is succinct, straightforward, unsarcastic to the point. I really, really doubt that Ziemia is Jon.

It shouldn't be dangerous to agree with Jon. I agree with Jon about Peirce's Pragmatic Maxim and about a number of other issues regarding Peirce. Jon used to post to peirce-l, where I sometimes agreed with him, sometimes tangled with him. I disagree with Jon (not to mention Peirce) about the adequacy of Peirce's object-sign-interpretant triad as a basis for logical/semiotic relations. I agree with Jon and Ziemia about the inappropriateness of the "female impersonater" label hanging near Peirce's head. I appreciate the administrators' help in letting this article be edited. But the atmosphere around here is like a college dorm now. "Female impersonator." Very funny. Can anybody please stop thinking of Tootsie for five minutes?

Everything was just fine, the article was finally peaceful and editable yet free of its long reversion wars, when disambiguation merely said "Not to be confused with Charles Pierce". Now instead the reversion war has restarted over this stuff. Well, I'll make myself scarce for a while. The Tetrast 00:10, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

The Commens Dictionary of Peirce's Terms

The Commens Dictionary of Peirce's Terms should not be confused with any Commons dictionary. It's got its own Website and everything, check it out http://www.helsinki.fi/science/commens/dictionary.html The word "commens" itself is Peirce's word for that which he also called the "commind". Basically it's com- + mens or "mind". The Tetrast 18:51, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Time to end the female impersonator fun

It turns out that there are the following Charles/Charlie Pierce entries in Wikipedia:

• Charles Pierce -- Female impersonator. Earliest edit: 18 February 2002 156.153.255.195
• Charlie Pierce, a.k.a Charles P. Pierce -- Sportswriter. Earliest edit: 19 November 2005 JB82
• Charles B. Pierce -- American movie director. Earliest edit: 24 September 2006 Lcduke
• Charles Wilson Pierce -- U.S. Representative from Alabama. Earliest edit: 4 June 2007 Polbot

The impression, that the "female impersonator" phrase is intended for humor or spite, rather than for concern about the female impersonator himself, is reinforced by the fact that the disambiguation sentence, so quickly edited to retain the "female impersonator" phrase -- with an un-Jonlike reverter Ziemia so quickly banned as Jon's suspected sock (yes, the others were Jonlike) -- has been allowed to stand with Harrypotter's accidental misspelling of the female impersonator's name as if it were "Peirce" instead of "Pierce". Now that it turns out that there are at least four people named Charles Pierce with Wikipedia pages, perhaps the disambiguation can be edited simply point to Pierce (surname), which I've updated to include the already-existent Pierce pages. But I won't touch that disambiguation sentence, it seems to be some sort of line in the sand. The Tetrast 20:19, 24 September 2007 (UTC) Revised The Tetrast 20:24, 24 September 2007 (UTC). Addendum: If Jon reads this, I would suggest that he leave the disambiguation sentence alone. Let those who insisted on it make the changes which they now must make. The Tetrast 20:45, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Now I see how to do it:

For people with the similar name Charles Pierce ("i" before "e", not after it), see Pierce (surname).

The Tetrast 21:52, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Female impersonator "Peirce" has been corrected to "Pierce" See http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Charles_Peirce&diff=160109713&oldid=160104920 as result of edit
21:28, 24 September 2007 Jpgordon (Talk | contribs) (69,823 bytes) (No, it didn't.) (undo)
--"No, it didn't"? It didn't reinforce the impression? But the impression is even further reinforced by disregard for Wikipedia:Disambiguation#Disambiguation_links:

Where there are several articles associated with the same ambiguous term, include a link to a separate disambiguation page.

and by disregard for second Charles Pierce (the sportswriter) already mentioned atop the female impersonator's page Charles Pierce.

Now, will you please stop this and repair the disambiguation sentence? The Tetrast 22:52, 24 September 2007 (UTC) Corrected above-mentioned sportswriter "Peirce" to "Pierce" The Tetrast 22:56, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Update: The list now stands at Charles Peirce plus six seven eight people named Charles Pierce.

1. Charles Pierce -- Female impersonator. Earliest edit: 18 February 2002 156.153.255.195
2. Charlie Pierce, a.k.a Charles P. Pierce -- Sportswriter. Earliest edit: 19 November 2005 JB82
3. Charles B. Pierce -- American movie director. Earliest edit: 24 September 2006 Lcduke
4. Charles Wilson Pierce -- U.S. Representative from Alabama. Earliest edit: 4 June 2007 Polbot
5. Charles Pierce Davey (Chuck Davey) -- American-born welterweight boxer and boxing commissioner for Michigan. Earliest edit: 31 August 2007 Chezzles.ze.great
6. Edward C. Pierce (Edward Charles Pierce), U.S. politician and physician from Michigan. Earliest edit: 12 July 2006 Ropcat
7. Justin Pierce (Justin Charles Pierce) -- English-American actor & professional skateboarder. Earliest edit: 26 January 2006 Denee
8. Ricky Pierce (Ricky Charles Pierce) -- retired NBA basketball player. Earliest edit: 22 September 2005 Giantsrule

Seeing that there are pages disambiguating Kyle Pierce, Jack Pierce, and William Pierce, I have created a page Charles Pierce (disambiguation) containing the Charles Pierce's and Charles Peirce as well. Now you can repair the disambiguation sentence with this:

For people with the similar name Charles Pierce ("i" before "e", not after it), see Charles Pierce (disambiguation).

The Tetrast 00:59, 25 September 2007 (UTC) Revised The Tetrast 01:10, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

I'm not sure what I've stepped into, but I hope that the simple reference to the dismbiguation page will suffice. DCDuring 01:15, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you, thank you, thank you! The Tetrast 01:18, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Recent copyedits

I have not looked forward to the time when secondary sources would be needed to clarify some of Peirce's concepts. Where, for instance, is the source justifying this edit? My recollection is that Peirce went farther than referring to just the experimental consequences of the "thing" to which a concept refers, but also was referring to the experimental consequences of the application of the concept itself to the thing it is intended to refer. The distinction is not insignificant. But I'd like to look at the source. Thanks. ... Kenosis 05:28, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

That's just a misconception, not founded in Peirce.

Please supply the source where Peirce goes beyond, in the sense which you seem to recollect, in order to identify a concept's meaning with the actual consequences themselves of the application of the concept.

Peirce usually clearly equates conception of thing with conception of conceivable practical consequences of thing.

You see a source right in the article itself:

Consider what effects that might conceivably have practical bearings you conceive the objects of your conception to have. Then, your conception of those effects is the whole of your conception of the object. (Peirce, CP 5.438.)

There are more statements by Peirce of the Pragmatic Maxim at the article on the Pragmatic maxim.

Here's one:

Such reasonings and all reasonings turn upon the idea that if one exerts certain kinds of volition, one will undergo in return certain compulsory perceptions. Now this sort of consideration, namely, that certain lines of conduct will entail certain kinds of inevitable experiences is what is called a "practical consideration". Hence is justified the maxim, belief in which constitutes pragmatism; namely:
In order to ascertain the meaning of an intellectual conception one should consider what practical consequences might conceivably result by necessity from the truth of that conception; and the sum of these consequences will constitute the entire meaning of the conception. (Peirce, CP 5.9, 1905).

And here's another. The following remark by Peirce, about his own previous statements of the Pragmatic Maxim, is especially notable:

This employment five times over of derivates of concipere must then have had a purpose. In point of fact it had two. One was to show that I was speaking of meaning in no other sense than that of intellectual purport. The other was to avoid all danger of being understood as attempting to explain a concept by percepts, images, schemata, or by anything but concepts. I did not, therefore, mean to say that acts, which are more strictly singular than anything, could constitute the purport, or adequate proper interpretation, of any symbol. I compared action to the finale of the symphony of thought, belief being a demicadence. Nobody conceives that the few bars at the end of a musical movement are the purpose of the movement. They may be called its upshot. (Peirce, CP 5.402 note 3, 1906).

Also see Peirce's "How to Make Our Ideas Clear" http://www.cspeirce.com/menu/library/bycsp/ideas/id-frame.htm . It is nis classic statement of Pragmatism. Follow the distinction among the first grade of clarity (the familiar immediate), the second grade of clarity (logicians' "distinctness", the clarity of the parts of the definition), and the third grade of clarity (pragmatic clarity, clarification in terms of conceivable practical consequences of the object portrayed by the conception). See how he then defines the real in the second and third grades of clarity.

Second: that which is what it is, independently of what you or I or any definite community of researchers thinks of it.
Third: that which would be reached inevitably by research adequately prolonged.

Note that his definition of the real involves reference to the experimental process, and that his definition of the real is not the same thing as his Pragmatic Maxim, though he employs the latter in arriving at the former.

Now, if you have a passage from Peirce in which he identifies a concept's meaning with actual consequences as such, please supply it.

12:13, 25 September 2007 (UTC) Corrected The Tetrast 12:15, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Now, there is an experimental process for which the Pragmatic Maxim supplies the method, in that which seems to be Peirce's own view, when one is clarifying propositions through their consequences. That is the experimentation beginning with the hypothetical proposition itself and proceeding by the mental testing of said proposition by considering what would be the practical consequences of the proposition's portrayed reality, as when Peirce says, "These propositions cannot be regarded as certain; and, in order to bring them to a further test, it is now proposed to trace them out to their consequences" in "Some Consequences of Four Incapacities Claimed For Man", Journal of Speculative Philosophy 2, 1868, reprinted in CP5.265, see http://www.cspeirce.com/menu/library/bycsp/conseq/cn-frame.htm The Tetrast 13:29, 25 September 2007 (UTC) Much corrected The Tetrast 13:54, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

The segue from the Pragmatic Maxim to the discussion of methods of research and verification seemed too abrupt, given the Pragmatic Maxim's being a method of reflection for clarifying concepts by further concepts. I've revised the segue into something that's kind of safe and general, but I may be able to get some help from professional philosophers and scholars of Peirce, if people think there's a need. The Tetrast 01:02, 27 September 2007 (UTC) Minor but helpful revision The Tetrast 01:03, 27 September 2007 (UTC) I mean that I just made a minor but helpful revision of that which I just said here in Talk. I must oftener remember: Preview is my friend. The Tetrast 01:05, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

In the first sentence of the sub-head "Poverty," a word is out of order. The sentence reads: "In 1887 Peirce spent part of his inheritance from his parents to purchase 2,000 acres (8 km²) rural near Milford, Pennsylvania, land which never yielded an economic return." The word "rural" should be placed before "land," to read "rural land near Milford, Pennsylvania...." I would do this, but the page is locked for editing. [WLH, 13 Dec 2007] —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.225.247.116 (talk) 16:13, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. I've repaired the problem, which I may myself have accidentally caused! The Tetrast (talk) 18:35, 13 December 2007 (UTC)

Theory of Categories

Sorry I put nothing in the edit line, somebody knocked on the door and I hit the enter button by mistake. Anyway, I've shortened the section by creating a new article Categories (Peirce) and restoring some old material there (with a few tweaks and an update), which helps outline the pertinence of the long quote from Peirce's "Prolegomena." Same table both in section here and in separate article? Well, I hope to enrich the version at the separate article, make it more elaborate or something. The Tetrast 01:55, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Reordering of article

Please don't rush to revert! It's done to bring the topics into harmony with Peirce's classification of the sciences. See Classification of the sciences (Peirce). This will create the opportunity to bring in some neglected threads of his thought, in a natural way. The Tetrast 21:03, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

It turns out that Peirce had the same idea, and worked it out into further detail, for his memoirs in 1902 for his Carnegie application. See Joseph Ransdell's comments and his tabular list of titles of Peirce's proposed list of memoirs in 1902 for his Carnegie application, Eprint The Tetrast 21:00, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

On rereading the "Dynamics of Inquiry" subsection, I realized that it, or its text, belonged back somewhere like where it originally stood, anyway near the beginning of the discussion of logic/semiotics. It really is a general discussion of Peirce's interest in inquiry, semiotics, etc., which Peirce himself "filed" under (philosophical) "Logic" which he cast as Formal Semiotic. ("Logic Proper" was a subdivision thereof). The distinction between the syllogistic approach versus the sign-theoretic approach as two approaches to the same thing is one that comes in handy, since new readers often don't get that Peirce's (formal) semiotics is philosophical logic pursued in terms of signs and sign processes. I guess what I'm struggling with here is that I don't see how to significantly shrink it, but I don't see how to spin it off into its own article, either. Well, maybe a little time will help. The Tetrast 21:41, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Influenced

23:57, 10 October 2007 Jlwelsh (Talk | contribs) (81,438 bytes) (Added "Influenced" section to info box and added Habermas to that section.) (undo)

Habermas isn't the only one! This could be fun. Especially one has the TOC unhidden, there's plenty of space for the others whom Peirce has influenced. William James, John Dewey, to begin with. The Tetrast 02:15, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Abbreviation

It's been brought to my attention that the standard abbreviation for the Writings of Charles S. Peirce. A chronological Edition is not "CE" but "W". And that turns out to be the abbreviation already used at the German Wikipedia's Peirce bibliography http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_S._Peirce/Schriften. So I'll make the change here. I've already done so at Charles Sanders Peirce bibliography. The Tetrast 13:02, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

Philosophy: Logic, or semiotic

I moved the "F.R.L" quote to the front (it's no longer in "Theory of Inquiry"), shortened the quote, added some discussion, and made lots of briefenings of phrase elsewhere in the section, so that, I hope, overall the section is only a bit longer now than it was before. The Tetrast 20:26, 15 October 2007 (UTC) I've corrected my typo "F.R.I." here in Talk and in one place in the article, to "F.R.L." The Tetrast 21:25, 15 October 2007 (UTC)

I don't think that your rewrite of Peirce's paragraph on the FRL improved it any, and there's nothing wrong with using a hefty block quote of his original words in a matter as weighty as this. Ian Ouellette 03:46, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

As to "improving" F.R.L., that's a strawman. I managed to get a whole lot more info from "F.R.L" into the article while lengthening the article that much less, and counterbalancing that loud "Semiotics" template that somebody dragged up. The weighty matter about the F.R.L. proper and its corollary were already here, but the weighty matter about the four barriers was not previously here in the section, nor was most of it in the article at all. Now fallibilism and the rest (Peirce's philosophy is large) are right up front in the philosophy: logic, or semiotic section, and their front seats are secured by referenced links regarding the presuppositions of Logic. AND I have included links to where people can read all of "F.R.L." on even the slowest-downloading computers. The Tetrast 12:27, 16 October 2007 (UTC). As to freely adding to article length, I'm not eager to do that, and anyway it's somebody else's goal and battle. Generally I've been lengthening the article, but always while doing my best not to do so by leaps and bounds, and the result is that I've introduced or re-introduced a bunch of things that have been either not here lately or not here at all. Peirce's philosophy is large. The Tetrast 12:31, 16 October 2007 (UTC) Also look at all the little touches, which experienced Peirce readers know are no mere "touches," which I manage to retain. Almost anybody else would have omitted the part about "in one sense, this sole" and the part about metaphysicians' addiction to blocking of inquiry, which I also secured by mentioning Peirce's placement of logic before metaphysics, a placement for which he argued more than once, and which placement is a subject to which current discussion often turns when newbies start pressing about supposedly insufficiently narrow metaphysical assumptions in the logic. The Tetrast 13:30, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

I just think that Peirce's setup works best when left intact, as people often get confused about the relationship between the FRL and its Corollary. Ian Ouellette 15:38, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Not only have I left Peirce's setup intact, discussing the issues in the order in which he discussed them, making explicit the logical connections ("corollarial"), and getting more of "F.R.L"s content into the article than ever was there before, but also generally I'm the one who introduced Peirce's setup for the organization of the article's discussions of his maths and philosophy, and now there's a natural place for it if we get into his scientific work too. Now, somebody may like Peirce's prose best, but there is no option to replace the article (and septuple its length) with a sequence of texts by Peirce. But I've also even provided the reader with a dozen or more times worth of that option, too, than there used to be here ever before, the option to read Peirce's own texts, by embedding so many links here and elsewhere (and look at the bibliography), that the articles all fairly rattle in a joyful way. The Tetrast 20:18, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I emphasized the difference between the F.R.L. proper and its corollary. The Tetrast 20:28, 16 October 2007 (UTC)

Article length 2

I subdivided the opening section of "Philosophy: Logic, or semiotic", and while such explicit marks of organization help the reader of a long article, one also notices, gee, the article is long. I rephrased for economy quite a bit a day or two ago in the text now called "Dynamics of inquiry" but there's only so much I can do in that direction. How urgent is the issue of length now for the Peirce article as a whole? I'm still kind of new around here. Should I move the length question to the top of the agenda, or should I not worry about it too much just as yet? The Tetrast 02:04, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Sure has gotten quiet around here. Whoda ever thunk it? The Tetrast 03:56, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Attribution: Logic of relatives, Kaina Stoicheia, etc.

There were four "Logic of relatives" articles, an "On a New List of Categories" article, and a "Kaina Stoicheia" article, all nearly stubs, a few sentences in the main body of each, which Awbrey created way back. I've moved that of his material (some sentences) which was useful into the main Peirce article here. The Kaina Stoicheia article was stub-like except for a long quote of text from Peirce's article, and that text and the rest of Peirce's article are all available (the same text, I checked) in the Arisbe version, to which I linked. The Tetrast (talk) 22:33, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

I added Awbrey's material from the above-mentioned separate articles into the corresponding subsections (the LOR, KS, & ONLC subsections, themselves already mostly by Awbrey) under "Works". The Tetrast 17:47, 30 November 2007 (UTC) Inserted a few words here. The Tetrast 20:44, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Another attribution: I revived the coherentism reference and link, for which Jon Awbrey was originally responsible http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Charles_Peirce&diff=104257071&oldid=104126178 The Tetrast 17:17, 4 December 2007 (UTC). Update: I don't know whether that was Awbrey -- actually it says "Farmer Kiss" and I kind of assumed it was Awbrey. I should read less quickly. The Tetrast 18:03, 4 December 2007 (UTC)

Long Pragmatism section

Now I'm thinking of moving some of the "Pragmatism" section into the main article on "Pragmaticism". But I'm running out of energy for tonight. The Tetrast (talk) 22:44, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

GFDL

Note to whoever moves contributions from one article to another: The GFDL requires author attribution to be retained, and the customary way to do that at wikipedia is to add appropriate information into the edit summary and/or the talk page. In the case of articles like these that basically have one author, a statement like that indicating Jon Awbrey as the primary author of material in the article prior to (January 2007?) in both an edit summary (perhaps of a null edit?) and on the talk page would be appropriate. (Often I move content from one article to another and say in the edit summary "moved from name of article". That doesn't work if the article is then deleted. Why people don't just make the articles redirects instead of deletions makes no sense to me.) WAS 4.250 (talk) 18:13, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Example Edit summary says: "Agriculture policy concerns - some content from Citrus canker, Foot and mouth disease, Bovine spongiform encephalopathy" WAS 4.250 (talk) 00:08, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Yes, I see. I already did some of that just above in Talk:Charles Peirce section "Logic of relatives, Kaina Stoicheia, etc." Maybe that section should have a different name. Or I should add "Attribution" to its name. Also see the talk page at Talk:Semiotic_elements_and_classes_of_signs_(Peirce). Just last night in the Attributions section I added a link to an old version of a section in the main Peirce article, a section which had been deleted and which I revived as the basis for the new "Semiotic elements and classes of signs (Peirce)" article. I had written a lot of that section, and others had written some, maybe a lot -- Jon may have written quite a bit of it but one would have to dig back through the main Peirce article's edit histories to nail down which things he wrote. The Tetrast (talk) 00:23, 30 November 2007 (UTC) Fixed typos. The Tetrast (talk) 00:26, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for that. Jon put a lot of hard work into giving this gift of knowledge to the world and he is legally and ethically entitled to reasonable attribution per its GFDL copy-left copyright. I'm sure that whatever you wind up doing in this regard will be well within what is appropriate. Thank you for helping to improve Wikipedia. WAS 4.250 (talk) 00:54, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

I have restored the subarticles as redirects. Kaldari (talk) 20:28, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

References versus Endnotes

I've been thinking that it would be simpler in a number of cases to link directly to entries in the References section. In fact I already set up some links WITH return links but the return links are a pain, and the complexity of reference will make it hard for others to edit.

How about this?: When the endnote would simply be a reference to a work without annotation or specific page number, I add a superscripted "REF", for example ^REF, with a link to the entry in references, and I somewhere somewhere tell the viewer to use the browser's "back" button in order to return to the original place in the article text.

Then also there would be these advantages:

• When there are multiple links to a single reference entry, it's not like an endnote where you have to make sure that the endnote's text is in the first link. The references' texts are all down in the References section, that's where they're edited, when one edits them at all (no annotations to edit).
• One can link to references from footnotes.

And it's easy to find the span id (since they're all together there).

Or instead of ^REF I could use a whatchamacallit, a ^, maybe boldfaced, like this: ^.

Please, comments, cautions, any? The Tetrast (talk) 20:31, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Well, the reference would need to be stated at least briefly up in the original text, e.g., "Haack 2002", enough that a person could manually find the reference if they needed to. The Tetrast (talk) 20:36, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

The caron (inverted circumflex) is too small, and maybe not common enough in fonts, likewise the small tilde.
How about † or † ? The Tetrast (talk) 21:02, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps Integrated Multi-Trophic Aquaculture will give you ideas? I suggest you look at other articles and use something that is used somewhere else, perhaps in a featured article. If you invent something new here it will wind up being unmaintainable. WAS 4.250 (talk) 21:21, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

As far as I can tell, the Aquaculture article simply uses footnotes and calls them "References and Notes". There's no alphabetization. You're right though, if I invent something new, it will wind up being unmaintainable. But maybe I'll come up with an idea that stays within the familiar ways. The Tetrast (talk) 21:57, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Pronunciation of "Peirce"

This article has had enough issues over the question of what to say about the pronunciation of Peirce's name in the past. The resolution was to include no phonetic rendition at the cluttered beginning of the article at all. People keep playing with it, putting in one version or another, and so on. In other words, there's no way that Kawamikagami's edit will last anyway. The resolution was simply to omit such renditions from the main body of the text, especially given the clutter already in the first paragraph.

I was the one who came along and added a footnote including all the phonetic renditions (which I put there especially for those for whom English is not a first language, for instance editors of Peirce wikis in other languages -- a footnote with a link to the Peirce Edition Project explaining how it is that "Peirce" is pronounced like "purse", not "pierce"). Meanwhile what the average reader needs to know is that "Peirce" is pronounced like the word "purse."

Moreover, the phonetic rendition which Kwamikagami is attempting to add is one of the inferior ones. The vowel in Peirce's name is an 'r-colored vowel and whether the "r" is clearly pronounced or not depends on whether the speaker clearly pronounces the "r" in words like "purse" and "word." Peirce himself probably did not clearly pronounce it, since he grew up in the Harvard University area. The Tetrast (talk) 14:22, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

A couple points: (1) Per MoS, pronunciation should be in the IPA, with sound-alikes etc. used as adjuncts. (Not that the MoS has to be followed.) (2) We shouldn't use dialect-specific pronunciations unless we clarify what we're doing. If you follow the help link, you'll be told /ɝ/ is the sound of words like purse, however you pronounce that - exactly what you're saying. (3) SAMPA is obsolete and deprecated in Wikipedia. (4) Your other transcription links to a non-existent pronunciation key. That does nothing to help the non-English speaker, who most likely will have no idea what /û/ is supposed to represent. (And which by the way you specified as being rhotic: "pûrs".)

Right now the name has <ɜr> (that was an easier edit from the bot). Would <ɝ> be preferable as being more rhotically ambiguous? kwami (talk) 14:39, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

The "ɝ" character is barely legible on screen, even when I increase the font size, and only a sharp-eyed linguist will understand it by looking at it.

I used the "pûrs" because that's what that system specified for rendition of the word "purse."

A rendition which encloses the "r" in the parentheses is the one likeliest to be understood, and that's what's good about two of the renditions.

Most foreign-language readers trying to read the article will not be entirely unfamiliar with typical English phonetic renditions.

The rendition of an r-colored vowel is not dialectical, rather it refers to the covariance of pronunciation with dialect.

The enPR link led to an entry when I first added it; now however there's a corresponding page only at Wikipedia, not at Wiktionary.

And again, as I said, when there's a phonetic rendition in the main body of the text, people keep coming along and playing with it, and there's enough clutter in there already. Please let's stick with the previous resolution of the issue, the resolution which actually lasted for a while. The Tetrast (talk) 15:02, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Moreover, the use of all three phonetic renditions in the footnote helps assure not only that fans of each system are happy, it also helps assure the reader that the surprising pronunciation being stated for "Peirce" is no mere typographical error in the wiki itself. The Tetrast (talk) 15:19, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

Okay, at least let me clean up the footnote a bit (ASCII double hyphens, etc.), and update the links. When I'd checked, the template had lead to a blank page, so evidently someone fixed it in the last few hours. But it isn't necessary to say 'sounds like "purse"' seven (not three) times - people will understand with just the five! The "rendition of an r-colored vowel" works for all transcriptions, including the IPA, and no one is going to understand SAMPA unless they already can read the IPA - it is simply the IPA in ASCII, and we're not confined to ASCII. Also, ɝ is found in hundreds of articles, and no one has complained that it's illegible, except for one person who couldn't make out any IPA symbols at all. And, actually, most non-English readers are completely baffled by renditions such as 'pûrs'. kwami (talk) 20:44, 6 December 2007 (UTC)

---

I just checked OED for pronunciation of purse (n.). Brit. /pəːs/, U.S. /pərs/ 128.135.239.211 (talk) 05:44, 26 May 2010 (UTC)

I've moved the above comment to after the text in this subsection. Please place new comments after old ones, not before.

Most exact rendition /ˈpɝːs/

The most exact representation of the (vowel + rhotic) + lengthening is "ɝː" but nobody likes it, it's mysterious-looking and hard to read (look at the whole thing without boldface: /ˈpɝːs/) and most of the few general readers to click over to the Wikipedia:IPA for English will end up spending excessive time tracking it down; but it "co-varies" with dialect depending on how that dialect treats "r" and still puts "Peirce" correctly into the class of words which rhyme with "terse" in every dialect of English, including those Scottish and Irish dialects in which "terse" does not quite rhyme with "purse"; that is to say, in whatever way an English-speaker pronounces "terse", that person pronounces "Peirce" correctly by making it rhyme with "terse". "ɜr" does not explicitly indicate the r's droppability but still is best after "ɝː" in other respects, and anyway, it's less likely to baffle the general reader to the point of annoyance. Now, the rendition here was "pɝːs" (which I myself had added after previous proddings) until User:Kwamikagami changed it to "pɜrs". See User_talk:Kwamikagami/Archive_8#IPA_for_.22Peirce.22 for 24 April 2009 discussion of change by User:Kwamikagami (who specializes in language articles) to "pɜrs" at Pragmatism article which was followed (after the discussion) by same change to "pɜrs" (current form) by User:Kwamikagami at Peirce article (edit at 07:38, 13 June 2009 http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Charles_Sanders_Peirce&action=historysubmit&diff=296129048&oldid=296052125). Please review other pronunciation discussions on this page. There should be some in archives here too. Also see Wikipedia:IPA for English. It's a well-trodden path at this article. Brits, Bostonites, and other r-droppers will drop post-vocalic r's from speech in spite of written presence, while written representation without r's is very confusing to those who don't drop them from speech. The intro section is cluttered enough without adding dialectical variations unneeded by those who speak those dialects and which thus are more about English than about Peirce. The Tetrast (talk) 16:48, 26 May 2010 (UTC)

Article length again

In response to the article's being tagged for length, I've moved a bunch of material from the Pragmatism section into the Pragmaticism wiki. I'll look around to see what else I can do. The Tetrast (talk) 16:14, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Now I've moved most of the material from the "Science of Review" section into the wiki Classification of the sciences (Peirce). The Tetrast (talk) 16:41, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Now I've deleted a paragraph from the "Categories" section. The paragraph still appears in the Categories (Peirce) wiki. The Tetrast (talk) 17:02, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

I put some important stuff back into the Pragmatism section, but did a lot of tweaking for brevity throughout the section. Basically, the three grades of clearness, the definitions of truth and the real, and some mention of Peirce's distinction of theoretical from practical standards of inquiry, are important enough to remain in the article somehow. Meanwhile, I'll keep looking for other ways to briefen. The Tetrast (talk) 18:29, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

I took out the long Putnam quote, added a footnote linking to it elsewhere, and added a mention of C.I. Lewis's remarks, and added a footnote to them, too. The Tetrast (talk) 19:02, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

I dunno, I'm looking at the Wiki on Article Series. Maybe that's the way to go. The Tetrast (talk) 19:50, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

When I copy out the main body into an html email, it comes to around 234 KB. When I copy the sections with Abbrevations, Footnotes, References, etc., that comes to around 107 KB. So almost 1/3 of the artices bytes seems to be outside the main body of the text. Using the ratio 234/107 as a rough gauge, then, if the article is 99 KB right now, then around 68 or 70 KB of it is the main body. The Tetrast (talk) 20:41, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Quick note in passing, editor to editor. (I placed the page length warning on the page.) If you want to figure the total length, when you hit 'edit page' it will show the KB size at the top- no need for laborious cut and pasting.

Additionally, article length is simply a guideline. Personally, I feel that the infobox may be more valuable than the space you win by deleting it. Speaking as a layman on Peirce, an article of this magnitude seriously benefits from the summary the box provides, and its deletion doesn't address the article's problem directly. My humble suggestion would be the creation of two or three subpages on Peirce's major contributions in different fields, e.g., Mathematical contributions of Peirce or Philosophical contributions of Peirce. As far as article length goes, I would aim for around 70KB max, but don't feel the need to sacrifice article clarity just for the sake of length... length is always negotiable.

Excellent work on the article, carry on. Chromancer (talk) 22:18, 12 December 2007 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm thinking about it. Some might think that it's okay for the Peirce wiki to be about as long as it is, and a lot of it is footnotes, references, further reading, etc., which officially "doesn't count" toward article length, but the fact is that I've been thinking in terms of further expansion, so your kind of solution seems inevitable. The sections on Peirce's maths, philosophy, etc., are now structured according to Peirce's own classifications, which were pretty comprehensive, and he had hoped to write his intellectual memoirs according to that structure. So there is a structure in place to include rather more of his contributions than I've discussed so far, and I haven't even finished with the philosophical ones yet -- there's not even a mention of his "critical commonsensism" yet. I'm hoping to get some help on the mathematical contributions, since he did work in areas besides mathemtical logic and algebra of relations. As to the infobox, I'll put it back in. I didn't mind getting rid of it for certain reasons but a solution has occurred to me regarding those reasons. The Tetrast (talk) 02:31, 18 December 2007 (UTC)

Merging and GFDL

Usual reading of the GFDL is that there is no violation since the full list of authors remains stored in the database. The list of authors from any particular deleted article can be asked at the Administrator Noticeboard, if needed. Please do not disrupt Wikipedia to prove a point. -- lucasbfr ^talk 04:24, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

Note that Prescisive abstraction is not deleted, and its history is readable. I have undeleted Kaina Stoicheia and The Simplest Mathematics, and their history is now readable too. -- lucasbfr ^talk 04:37, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

A specific explanation of any other problems would be appreciated, should there be any. – Luna Santin (talk) 04:38, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

The other subarticles have been undeleted and changed to redirects. Kaldari (talk) 20:51, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

• If we want to be completely anal about it we can move the pages to subpages of this article and then merge and leave the redirect, but as noted above there is no need to do this as long as we can show where the edit was made, which we can from deleted history. What's most disappointing here is that one person's obsession with having his name in the edit history is causing so much work for others. I rather wish he'd sue us and let the courts decide. Guy (Help!) 21:25, 21 December 2007 (UTC)
  • (drive by comment-commenting only on the GFDL issue raised, not the actual content) Last I checked, the dev's have NOT placed any guarantee on maintaining the deleted edit history, and even if they had this would break attribution for anyone forking or copying this article. — xaosflux ^Talk 04:31, 23 December 2007 (UTC)
  • Agree with Xaos. We should be very careful with such issues. The fact that Awbrey is annoying and cares more about his name than actual GFDL compliance doesn't really figure into it. We should obey the GFDL in both letter and spirit. This does both. JoshuaZ (talk) 15:58, 3 January 2008 (UTC)