>Gary-- Maybe I have Piercian intuitions? I felt there was some more
>"out there," our of "personal control" about meaning than sense. At
>the same time, I make SOME sense of a phrase like constructing
>meaning. Individuals don't construct meanings, they they were not
>handed down irrevocably by God/Darwin either. They emerge through
>joint activity of biologically human organisms. I think/believe?
>mike
it might be even worse for you -- explanation to follow :-)
peirce was struggling to find a middle way, to explain the same sorts of
issues you raise, between the prevailing choices:
1) 'mike cole' is a concrete manifestation of some universal we call 'human
being' and any reality or attendent meaning that we might want to assign to
'mike cole' is totally subordinate to the more abstract and therefore more
real and more meaningful 'human being.' therefore, 'mike cole' is only as
real as the 'human being' that he imperfectly embodies. real meaning
exists at the abstract level, and mere personal understandings are like
persons -- imperfect copies of a larger and more abstract reality.
2) what we call 'human being' is nothing more than the particular
aggregate of 'mike coles' and 'gary shanks' and the like, that we might
happen to have on hand at any particular place and time. meaning is not
part of this mix, so any meaning that any of these ciphers might want to
make is fine and dandy, because it doesnt really matter anyway. its just
meaning to them. larger codes of meaning like languages and cultures are
just agreed upon conventions to make things run smoother -- they have no
reality of their own....
ugh and double ugh.
peirce got out of this mess by taking the third way of duns scotus. here
are the two points of scotus that i think peirce and vygotsky and activity
theory all share:
1) 'human being' is real on its own terms and at its own level, but so is
'mike cole.' in a sense, 'mike cole' is more real, since it has to carry
within it the reality of 'human being-ness' and then extends it in a
systematic way into 'mike cole-ness' so, the individual is paradoxically
both subordinate to (model 1), but also more real than (model 2), the
abstract.
2) 'human being' cannot be directly experienced as such, but that does not
make it unreal. but it does make it unavailable to those of us who live in
cultural and sensory worlds. we can only see things like 'human being'
when they are manifested in our material or cultural experiences, but we do
not have to keep our understanding at that level. the example i like to
use is of the woman who has never considered the notion of 'fairness' until
she has three good children and only two cookies. but once 'fairness' has
been shown to us in the material and/or cultural world, then we are free to
pursue it at any level we can grasp. we do not have to ground it at every
turn to the material world, just because we found it there at the outset!
in other words, we have to start there, but we certainly are not bound or
committed to finish there...
i think there is a real affinity between activity work and scotus, but i
should warn you -- follows of scotus were known as duns men, and then
later, as dunces :-)
gary
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