Interpreter and Interpretant

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 1
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/01/06/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-1-a/

Questions about the relationship between “interpreters” and “interpretants”
in Peircean semiotics have broken out again. To put the matter as pointedly
as possible — because I know someone or other is bound to — “In a theory of
three‑place relations among objects, signs, and interpretant signs, where
indeed is there any place for the interpretive agent?”

By way of getting my feet on the ground with the issue I'll do what always
helped me before and review a small set of basic texts. Here is the first.

Figure 1. The Sign Relation in Aristotle
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.files.wordpress.com/2022/04/awbrey-awbrey-1995-e280a2-figure-1.png

❝Words spoken are symbols or signs (symbola) of affections or impressions
(pathemata) of the soul (psyche); written words are the signs of words
spoken. As writing, so also is speech not the same for all races of men.
But the mental affections themselves, of which these words are primarily
signs (semeia), are the same for the whole of mankind, as are also the
objects (pragmata) of which those affections are representations or
likenesses, images, copies (homoiomata).❞ (Aristotle, De Interp. i. 16a4).

Reference —

Aristotle, “On Interpretation” (De Interp.), Harold P. Cooke (trans.),
pp. 111–179 in Aristotle, Volume 1, Loeb Classical Library, William
Heinemann, London, UK, 1938.

Resources —

Survey of Pragmatic Semiotic Information
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2024/03/01/survey-of-pragmatic-semiotic-information-8/

Survey of Semiotics, Semiosis, Sign Relations
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2024/01/26/survey-of-semiotics-semiosis-sign-relations-5/

Regards,

Jon

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 2
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/01/07/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-2-a/

A idea of what Peirce means by an Interpretant and the part it plays
in a triadic sign relation is given by the following passage.

❝It is clearly indispensable to start with an accurate and broad analysis of the
nature of a Sign. I define a Sign as anything which is so determined by something
else, called its Object, and so determines an effect upon a person, which effect I
call its Interpretant, that the latter is thereby mediately determined by the former.
My insertion of “upon a person” is a sop to Cerberus, because I despair of making my
own broader conception understood.❞ (Peirce 1908, Selected Writings, p. 404).

According to his custom of clarifying ideas in terms of their effects, Peirce
tells us what a sign is in terms of what it does, the effect it brings to bear
on a “person”. That effect he calls the interpretant of the sign. And what
of that person? Peirce finesses that question for the moment, resorting to
a “Sop to Cerberus”, in other words, a rhetorical gambit used to side‑step
a persistent difficulty of exposition. In doing so, Peirce invokes the
hypostatic abstraction of a “person” who conducts the movement of signs
and embodies the ongoing process of semiosis.

Reference —

Peirce, C.S. (1908), “Letters to Lady Welby”, Chapter 24, pp. 380–432
in Charles S. Peirce : Selected Writings (Values in a Universe of Chance),
Edited with Introduction and Notes by Philip P. Wiener, Dover Publications,
New York, NY, 1966.

Resources —

Hypostatic Abstraction
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2008/08/08/hypostatic-abstraction/

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 3
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/01/08/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-3-a/

The following selection from Peirce's “Lowell Lectures on the Logic of Science”
(1866) lays out in detail his “metaphorical argument” for the relationship
between interpreters and interpretant signs.

❝I think we need to reflect upon the circumstance that every word implies
some proposition or, what is the same thing, every word, concept, symbol
has an equivalent term — or one which has become identified with it, —
in short, has an “interpretant”.

❝Consider, what a word or symbol is; it is a sort of representation.
Now a representation is something which stands for something. I will not
undertake to analyze, this evening, this conception of standing for something —
but, it is sufficiently plain that it involves the standing to something for
something. A thing cannot stand for something without standing to something
for that something. Now, what is this that a word stands to? Is it a person?

❝We usually say that the word “homme” stands to a Frenchman for “man”. It would be
a little more precise to say that it stands to the Frenchman's mind — to his memory.
It is still more accurate to say that it addresses a particular remembrance or image
in that memory. And what “image”, what remembrance? Plainly, the one which is the
mental equivalent of the word “homme” — in short, its interpretant. Whatever a word
addresses then or stands to, is its interpretant or identified symbol. […]

❝The interpretant of a term, then, and that which it stands to are identical.
Hence, since it is of the very essence of a symbol that it should stand to
something, every symbol — every word and every “conception” — must have an
interpretant — or what is the same thing, must have information or implication.❞
(Peirce 1866, Chronological Edition 1, pp. 466–467).

Reference —

Peirce, C.S. (1866), “The Logic of Science, or, Induction and Hypothesis”,
Lowell Lectures of 1866, pp. 357–504 in Writings of Charles S. Peirce :
A Chronological Edition, Volume 1, 1857–1866, Peirce Edition Project,
Indiana University Press, Bloomington, IN, 1982.

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 4
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/01/09/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-4-a/

Interpretation and Inquiry —

To illustrate the role of sign relations in inquiry we begin with Dewey's
elegant and simple example of reflective thinking in everyday life.

❝A man is walking on a warm day. The sky was clear the last time
he observed it; but presently he notes, while occupied primarily
with other things, that the air is cooler. It occurs to him that
it is probably going to rain; looking up, he sees a dark cloud
between him and the sun, and he then quickens his steps.

❝What, if anything, in such a situation can be called thought?
Neither the act of walking nor the noting of the cold is a thought.
Walking is one direction of activity; looking and noting are other
modes of activity. The likelihood that it will rain is, however,
something suggested. The pedestrian feels the cold; he thinks of
clouds and a coming shower.❞ (John Dewey, How We Think, 6–7).

In Dewey's narrative we can identify the characters of the sign relation
as follows. Coolness is a Sign of the Object rain, and the Interpretant
is the thought of the rain's likelihood. In his description of reflective
thinking Dewey distinguishes two phases, “a state of perplexity, hesitation,
doubt” and “an act of search or investigation” (p. 9), comprehensive stages
which are further refined in his later model of inquiry.

Reflection is the action the interpreter takes to establish a fund of connections
between the sensory shock of coolness and the objective danger of rain by way of the
impression rain is likely. But reflection is more than irresponsible speculation.
In reflection the interpreter acts to charge or defuse the thought of rain by seeking
other signs the thought implies and evaluating the thought according to the results
of that search.

Figure 2 shows the semiotic relationships involved in Dewey's story, tracing the
structure and function of the sign relation as it informs the activity of inquiry,
including both the movements of surprise explanation and intentional action.

The labels on the outer edges of the sign‑relational triple suggest the
significance of signs for eventual occurrences and the correspondence of
ideas with external orientations. But there is nothing essential about
the dyadic role distinctions they imply, as it is only in special or
degenerate cases that such projections preserve enough information
to determine the original sign relation.

Figure 2. Dewey's “Sign of Rain” Example
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.files.wordpress.com/2022/04/deweys-sign-of-rain-example.jpg

References —

Dewey, J. (1910), How We Think, D.C. Heath, Boston, MA.
Reprinted (1991), Prometheus Books, Buffalo, NY.
• https://www.gutenberg.org/files/37423/37423-h/37423-h.htm

Regards,

Jon

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 5
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/01/11/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-5-a/

Inquiry and Inference —

If we follow Dewey's “Sign of Rain” story far enough to consider the import
of thought for action, we realize the subsequent conduct of the interpreter,
progressing up through the natural conclusion of the episode — the quickening
steps, the seeking of shelter in time to escape the rain — all those acts amount
to a series of further interpretants for the initially recognized signs of rain
and the first impressions of the actual case. Just as critical reflection develops
the positive and negative signs which gather about an idea, pragmatic interpretation
explores the consequential and contrasting actions which give effective and testable
meaning to a person's belief in it.

Figure 3 charts the progress of inquiry in Dewey's narrative according to
the stages of reasoning identified in Peirce's theory of inquiry, focusing
on the compound pattern of inference formed by the first two steps.

Figure 3. Cycle of Inquiry
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.files.wordpress.com/2022/04/cycle-of-inquiry-grayscale.jpg

Step 1 is Abductive,
abstracting a Case from the consideration of a Fact and a Rule.
• Fact : C ⇒ A, In the Current situation the Air is cool.
• Rule : B ⇒ A, Just Before it rains, the Air is cool.
• Case : C ⇒ B, The Current situation is just Before it rains.

Step 2 is Deductive,
admitting the Case to another Rule and arriving at a novel Fact.
• Case : C ⇒ B, The Current situation is just Before it rains.
• Rule : B ⇒ D, Just Before it rains, a Dark cloud will appear.
• Fact : C ⇒ D, In the Current situation, a Dark cloud will appear.

What precedes is nowhere near a complete analysis of Dewey's example,
even as possible in a syllogistic framework, and it covers only the
first two steps of the inquiry process, but perhaps it will do for
a start.

Regards,

Jon

cc: https://www.academia.edu/community/5467KX

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 6
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/01/13/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-6-a/

Inquiry and Induction —

To understand the bearing of inductive reasoning on the closing phases
of inquiry there are a couple of observations we should make.

• Smaller inquiries are typically woven into larger inquiries,
whether the whole pattern of inquiry is carried on by a single
agent or by a complex community.

• There are several ways particular instances of inquiry are related
to ongoing inquiries at larger scales. Three modes of interaction
between component inquiries and compound inquiries may be described
under the headings of Learning, Transfer, and Testing of Rules.

Throughout the course of inquiry the reasoner makes use of rules
which have to be transported across intervals of experience, from
masses of experience where they are learned to moments of experience
where they are applied. Inductive reasoning is involved in the learning
and transfer of those rules, both in accumulating a knowledge base and
in carrying it through the times between acquisition and application.

• Learning
The main way induction contributes to an ongoing inquiry is
through the learning of rules, that is, by creating each rule
added to a knowledge base, or any rule used along the way.

• Transfer
The next way induction contributes to an ongoing inquiry is
through the operation of analogy, a two‑step combination of
induction and deduction which serves to transfer rules from
one context to another.

• Testing
Finally, every inquiry making use of a knowledge base amounts
to a “field test” of its rules. If the knowledge base fails to
serve any live inquiry in a satisfactory way then there is reason
to reconsider and possibly amend its rules.

Next time we'll examine how the principles of learning, transfer,
and testing apply to Dewey's “Sign of Rain” example.

References —

Awbrey, J.L., and Awbrey, S.M. (1995), “Interpretation as Action : The Risk
of Inquiry”, Inquiry : Critical Thinking Across the Disciplines 15(1), 40–52.
• https://www.pdcnet.org/inquiryct/content/inquiryct_1995_0015_0001_0040_0052

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 7
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/01/15/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-7-a/

Learning —

Rules in a knowledge base, as far as their effective content goes,
can be obtained by any mode of inference. For example, consider
a proposition of the following form.

• B ⇒ A, Just Before it rains, the Air is cool.

Such a proposition is usually induced from a consideration
of many past events, as follows.

• Case : C ⇒ B, In Certain events, it is just Before it rains.
• Fact : C ⇒ A, In Certain events, the Air is cool.

• Rule : B ⇒ A, Just Before it rains, the Air is cool.

However, the same proposition could also be abduced as an explanation
of a singular occurrence or deduced as a conclusion of a prior theory.

Resources —

Survey of Abduction, Deduction, Induction, Analogy, Inquiry
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2024/02/27/survey-of-abduction-deduction-induction-analogy-inquiry-4/

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 8
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/01/24/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-8-a/

Transfer —

What exactly gives the acquisition of a knowledge base
its distinctively inductive character? It is evidently
the “analogy of experience” involved in applying what
we've learned in the past to what confronts us in
the present.

Whenever we find ourselves approaching a problem with the thought,
“If past experience is any guide …” we can be sure the analogy of
experience has come into play. We are seeking to find analogies
between past experience as a totality and present experience as
a point of application.

From a statistical point of view what we mean is this — “If past experience is
a fair sample of possible experience then knowledge gained from past experience
may usefully apply to present experience”. It is that mechanism which allows a
knowledge base to be carried across gulfs of experience which remain indifferent
to the effective contents of its rules.

Next we'll examine how the transfer of knowledge through the analogy
of experience works out in the case of Dewey's “Sign of Rain” example.

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 9
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/01/27/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-9-a/

Transfer —

Let's examine how the transfer of knowledge through the analogy
of experience works in the case of Dewey's “Sign of Rain” example.

For concreteness, consider a fragment K_pres of the reasoner's
knowledge base which is logically equivalent to a conjunction
of two rules.

• K_pres ⇔ (B ⇒ A) ∧ (B ⇒ D).

K_pres may be thought of as a piece of knowledge or item of information
allowing for the possibility of certain conditions, expressed in the
form of a logical constraint on the present universe of discourse.

It is convenient to have the option of expressing all logical statements
in terms of their models, that is, in terms of the primitive circumstances
or elements of experience over which they hold true.

• Let E_past be the chosen set of experiences, or the circumstances in mind
under “past experience”.

• Let E_poss be the collective set of experiences, or the prospective total
of possible circumstances.

• Let E_pres be the current experience, or the circumstances immediately
present to the reasoner.

If we think of the knowledge base K_pres as referring to the “regime of experience”
over which it is valid, then the sets of models involved in the analogy may be
ordered according to the relationships of set inclusion or logical implication
existing among them.

In logical terms, the analogy of experience proceeds by inducing a Rule
about the validity of a current knowledge base and then by deducing a Fact,
the applicability of that knowledge base to a current experience.

Step 1 is Inductive, abstracting a Rule from a Case and a Fact.

• Case : E_past ⇒ E_poss, Chosen events fairly sample Collective events.
• Fact : E_past ⇒ K_pres, Chosen events support the Knowledge regime.
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
• Rule : E_poss ⇒ K_pres, Collective events support the Knowledge regime.

Step 2 is Deductive, admitting a Case to a Rule and arriving at a Fact.

• Case : E_pres ⇒ E_poss, Current events fairly sample Collective events.
• Rule : E_poss ⇒ K_pres, Collective events support the Knowledge regime.
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
• Fact : E_pres ⇒ K_pres, Current events support the Knowledge regime.

Regards,

Jon

[Jon Awbrey]

Interpreter and Interpretant • Selection 10
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.com/2025/02/11/interpreter-and-interpretant-selection-10-a/

Transfer —

Returning to the scene of Dewey's “Sign of Rain” example, let's continue
examining how the transfer of knowledge through the analogy of experience
works in that case.

By way of a recap, we began by considering a fragment K_pres of

the reasoner's knowledge base which is logically equivalent to
a conjunction of two rules.

• K_pres ⇔ (B ⇒ A) ∧ (B ⇒ D).

K_pres may be thought of as a piece of knowledge or item of information
allowing for the possibility of certain conditions, expressed in the form
of a logical constraint on the present universe of discourse.

Next we found it convenient to express all logical statements in terms of

their models, that is, in terms of the primitive circumstances or elements
of experience over which they hold true.

• Let E_past be the chosen set of experiences, or the circumstances in mind
under “past experience”.

• Let E_poss be the collective set of experiences, or the prospective total
of possible circumstances.

• Let E_pres be the current experience, or the circumstances immediately
present to the reasoner.

If we think of the knowledge base K_pres as referring to the “regime of experience”
over which it is valid, then the sets of models involved in the analogy may be ordered
according to the relationships of set inclusion or logical implication existing among them.

Figure 4 shows the subsumption relations involved in the analogy of experience.

Figure 4. Analogy of Experience
• https://inquiryintoinquiry.files.wordpress.com/2025/02/analogy-of-experience.png

In logical terms, the analogy of experience proceeds by inducing a Rule about the
validity of a current knowledge base and then by deducing a Fact, the applicability
of that knowledge base to a current experience.

Step 1 is Inductive, abstracting a Rule from a Case and a Fact.

• Case : E_past ⇒ E_poss, Chosen events fairly sample Collective events.
• Fact : E_past ⇒ K_pres, Chosen events support the Knowledge regime.
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
• Rule : E_poss ⇒ K_pres, Collective events support the Knowledge regime.

Step 2 is Deductive, admitting a Case to a Rule and arriving at a Fact.

• Case : E_pres ⇒ E_poss, Current events fairly sample Collective events.
• Rule : E_poss ⇒ K_pres, Collective events support the Knowledge regime.
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────
• Fact : E_pres ⇒ K_pres, Current events support the Knowledge regime.