tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1703983863002652001.post2069221566636532536..comments2024-03-21T08:50:20.533-07:00Comments on Pirates & Revolutionaries: The Positivity of Spinoza’s SemiologyCorry Shoreshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10021754334885248079noreply@blogger.comBlogger2125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1703983863002652001.post-6788163429855743302009-11-20T09:14:34.092-08:002009-11-20T09:14:34.092-08:00Ariel,
Thank you for asking. I had to consult a ...Ariel, <br /><br />Thank you for asking. I had to consult a Spinoza expert, Kvond at Frames / sing.<br /><br />[This is the link to his site, which is an excellent source of information and commentary on Spinoza as well as for other sorts of philosophy:<br />http://kvond.wordpress.com<br />]<br /><br />I will first try to answer your question directly, and then defer to kvond's explanation, which will be more helpful.<br /><br />So let's imagine we see an indicative sign. A milk carton lies flat on the table with milk spilled all around it. It could be that, as you say, we first imagine it falling, then use deductive logic to figure out the cause. So we might say that it could not have been the cat, who was with us the whole time. But the window is open. The wind blew many other things over. So it was probably the wind (because we have ruled out every other possibility). The meaning of the sign, the spilled milk, is that there were strong winds blowing into the house.<br /><br />Let's expand the answer by taking kvond's insights into account. We will say that signs unsuccessfully aim to capture a more profound truth about reality. Kvond explains that Spinoza advises us not to use words or imagined pictures to understand things. So there is a lot more to the story regarding the spilled milk. Many other causes and factors were at work, and we are only aware of certain signs of these things given to us in a very limited way.<br /><br />So perhaps we might say that the rational exercise of interpreting a sign does not stop with knowing that the wind blew the carton over. We can always learn more about the causes (and their causes). This will allow us to better interpret the reality that the sign is indicating. And perhaps as our knowledge builds, the sign will come less to serve as an indication. It might instead just be one among many consequences of the given circumstances.<br /><br />For more, see this posting by kvond:<br /><br />http://kvond.wordpress.com/2008/05/15/spinozas-chicken-a-nomological-concern/Corry Shoreshttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10021754334885248079noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1703983863002652001.post-12665530087703648862009-11-19T20:10:09.857-08:002009-11-19T20:10:09.857-08:00Do you think Spinoza would argue that the essence...Do you think Spinoza would argue that the essence of a sign may be conceived of by employing a rational thought process--thereby converting the representation of an object into a truism by first conceiving of it in one's imagination and ultimately conceiving of it as a rational thought deduced geometrically (or by employign dedcutive logic)?Unknownhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14734620995326368830noreply@blogger.com