Date: Fri, 8 Sep 1995 14:45:16 -0700
From: callihan-AT-callihan.seanet.com (Steven E. Callihan)
Subject: Nietzsche, Peirce, Pragmatism & the Theory of Relativity


On Sat, 26 Aug 1995 Erik D. Lindberg wrote:

>But I would be grateful if someone could explain to me how and in what
>way the conception of difference and negativity is connected to various
>paradigms from physics.

While surfing I came upon a pile of Charles S. Peirce stuff on the WWW
(http://nothing.com/peirce/Arisbe.html), including both considerable
material of his own along with a number of essays and reviews by
others in a Peircean vein included on the Peirce Telecommunity Project
Gopher (link from the Peirce home page above).  Although, I have only
just started to dive into this, it is already apparent to me that
there is an amazing degree to which Peirce anticipates Nietzsche in
quite a few important regards--primarily, at least as far as I can
tell so far, relative to the status of logic as something believed
rather than proved ("being" and "substance" as necessary conventions
within discourse, for instance, but with being having no substance and
substance having no being), the dependence of determinacy on a
narrative continuity as it appears to an interpreting observer, etc.
Of particular interest relative to your concern stated above is an
essay by John W. Oller, Jr., "Semiotic Theory Applied to Free Will,
Relativity, and Determinacy: Or, Why the Unified Field Theory Sought
by Einstein Could Not Be Found" (included in the Peirce Telecommunity
On-Line Library directory of the gopher).  Following is an excerpt
which I think fairly sums up the content of the article:

     "More specifically, by applying a version of semiotic theory
     grounded in the thought of C. S. Peirce...in what follows,
     these theorems are proved: (1) that relatively perfect
     determinacy is strictly a function of true narrative
     representations (i.e., ones concerning the unfolding events
     of experience) that an intelligent observer can both create
     and reasonably judge to be true; (2) that only such well-
     constructed narrative structures can be judged to have the
     connectedness necessary to the non-discrete continuum needed
     to sustain the classical theory of causation; (3) that only
     particular, relatively determined true narrative
     representations can provide a relatively perfect basis for
     any generalization whatever; (4) that relatively perfect
     determinacy is strictly and only a function of past events
     as experienced by a particular observer or plurality of
     them; (5) that relatively complete indeterminacy is
     associated with any event or state of affairs happened upon
     by a casual observer who has no knowledge of the prior
     history of the event or state in question; (6) that
     relativity (as Einstein conceived it) can only be defined
     with respect to the particular viewpoint of some particular
     observer (arbitrarily chosen) with which other viewpoints
     must be compared; (7) that the indeterminacy of physical
     events can never be removed by the material universe being,
     having been, or becoming however it may be, but only may be
     understood as related to the viewpoint of an intelligent
     observer who experiences particular events in that material
     universe and determines them relative to a particular
     narrative arrangement of his or her own experience; and,
     finally, (8) that only the kind of intelligence seen in
     living organisms can fix the relatively undetermined future
     by experiencing it as it passes into the relatively
     determined past of one or more observers."

Although the issues of difference and negativity are not specifically
treated here, it is not difficult, I think, to read them into (and
weave them into) the discourse here on determinacy and indeterminacy.
The Will to Power, if you will, as the determinant, the Eternal Return
of the Same as the indeterminant.

Does anyone else have any comments about bringing Peircean
"pragmatist" perspectives to bear on Nietzsche?

Steve

==============================================================================            Steven E. Callihan -- callihan-AT-callihan.seanet.com
  
               "Let us not pretend to doubt in philosophy 
                  what we do not doubt in our hearts."

        --Charles S. Peirce, "Some Consequences of Four Incapacities," 
               _Journal of Speculative Philosophy_ (1868)
==============================================================================


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