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Mathematical Epistemology from a Peircean Semiotic Point of View
Author(s): Michael Otte

Source: Educational Studies in Mathematics , 2006, Vol. 61, No. 1/2, Semiotic
Perspectives in Mathematics Education: A PME Special Issue (2006), pp. 11-38
Published by: Springer
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MICHAEL OTTE
MATHEMATICAL EPISTEMOLOGY FROM A PEIRCEAN

SEMIOTIC POINT OF VIEW*
ABSTRACT. Learning is better than knowing, generalization is more illuminating than ab

stract generality or universality because we perceive and thus become conscious of change
or development only. Signs and representations establish the dialectic of fixation on the
one hand and transformation on the other, which is so essential to learning and cognition.
Mathematical epistemology from a semiotic point of view therefore is above all a genetical
epistemology. All real mathematical activity is concerned with representations of mathe
matical entities rather than with things in themselves and with the processes of continuous
transformation of a given representation into others.
This paper tries to give an overview of the essential relationships between activity the
ory, epistemology and mathematical education, using the semiotics of Charles S. Peirce as
a unifying reference. It is certainly beyond the scope of such a paper to spell out all the
questions involved in every detail. Much of what is said in the four short sections to follow
is calling for further concretization and research.
KEY WORDS: complementarity of mathematical terms, mathematical epistemology, mean

ing, Peirce, sign
1. Some basic orientations, stated in more

or less popular terms
What is mathematical epistemology from a semiotic point of view? Th

is no short answer to this question. I shall, however, give some illustra
of what we mean by it, starting from the following assumptions. Th
assumptions should be understood in analogy to mathematical axio
They are to be approached rather directly without too much regard fo
inherent subtleties and puzzles and they are to be unfolded and expla
in more detail in future work.
Learning is better than knowing, generalization is more illuminatin
than abstract generality or universality because we perceive and thus
come conscious of change or development only. Signs and representat
establish the dialectic of fixation on the one hand and transformation o
other, which is so essential to learning and cognition. Mathematical e
temology from a semiotic point of view therefore is above all a gene
epistemology.
* Paper presented at PME 25 in Utrecht.
Educational Studies in Mathematics (2006) 61: 11-38

DOI: 10.1007/sl0649-006-0082-6 ? Springer 2006

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12 MICHAEL OTTE
All our cognitive access to reality is relative and mediated by signs,

rather than being direct and absolute. At the same time, objective activity
is the basis of all knowledge and all cognition. Signs must be incorporated
and thus depend on objects in order possibly to come into reality and to
function as signs. There is no absolute distinction between both, or, stated
somewhat differently, signs, as a rule, are not completely understood and
objects, on the other hand, are not really devoid of all meaning. A "complete
understanding" would perhaps be as impossible as a completely isolated
factual existent. As a consequence, one has to accept the existence of non
conceptual knowledge and experience. Even in pure mathematics there are
theorems, which are contingently true and cannot be explained (Chaitin,
2001, p. 24).
Thus we consider (semiotic) activity and critical awareness rather than
mental representation as the central notion of epistemology. It has, in fact,
always been a question whether we live in one or in different types of worlds
(Bateson, 1973, 215 ff). We opt for two, and the relations between signs
and objects, between meanings and facts, are therefore our main concern!
Meaning, Susanne Langer says, is a function of a term: "A function
is a pattern viewed with reference to one special term round which it
centers; this pattern emerges when looking at the given term in its total
relation to the other terms about it. The total may be quite complicated"
(Langer, 1996, p. 55). We must, however, be careful not to be led in our
endeavors to ascribe communicative function to contexts, which tend to
be more and more extensive (the psychological context, the educational
context, the socio-cultural context, etc.), because in the end we lose the
idea of sign, or of semiotic mediation itself. Holism as an epistemological
thesis, emphasizes, for instance, coherence and comprehension as essential
criteria of meaning and truth, such that taking this view to the extreme, only
a total system of knowledge seems fully adequate. Holism has, however,
to renounce the endeavor to achieve complete and detailed knowledge of
particulars. Such selective loss of detail is sometimes appropriate, but must
on other occasions be compensated by definite action. Action is not so much
concerned with coherent knowledge systems or theories, but rather with the
application of knowledge to a particular problem situation. The heuristic
principles and rules used in such situations never form coherent wholes. The
complementarity between holism and instrumentalism provides another
important orientation for semiotic epistemology.
Let us repeat these fundamental insights in somewhat different terms,
because their impact will be encountered all over again. Relating two enti
ties X and Y makes sense only if we gain in meaningfulness and explicative
power. A metaphor, for example, establishes a relationship between two
quite different entities and thereby sheds light on both. Now meaningfulness

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MATHEMATICAL EPISTEMOLOGY FROM A PEIRCEAN SEMIOTIC POINT OF VIEW 13
implies a gain in clarity, transparency and simplicity and is linked to a re

duction in complexity. In information theory, these facts can be expressed
in terms of a formal equation about the information content of an entity:
H(X, Y) = H(X) + H(Y). In words: Two objects X and Y are (algorith
mically) independent if their information content decomposes additively
(Chaitin, 1999, p. 96).
A theory must always be simpler than the set of facts it tries to explain.
Meaningfulness is thus based on abstraction and selective loss of detail.
Stated differently, representation implies generalization and abstraction.
One of the most important aspects of systemic thinking refers to its limita
tions. That is, not everything can be incorporated into a given system, not
everything can be explained by a given theory and not everything can have
a meaning within a given context. There are always brute contingent facts
that cannot be explained, and existents that can be indicated but cannot
be described or characterized. If this were not true, everything would be
predetermined as in Leibniz's representationalism.
This means that semiotic activity, which deals with non-symbolic signs
as well rather than merely with linguistic symbols or meanings, forms the
basis of creativity, communication and knowledge.
Signs have meanings and refer to objects. Meanings and objects of signs
may both be signs themselves. The ultimate meaning or basic foundation
of a sign cannot be a sign itself; it must be of the nature either of an in
tuition, or of a singular experience. The word 'Stuhl', for instance, does
not mean anything to a person who does not know German. To convey
the meaning of this symbol to such a person, one has to transform it into
something perceivable, presenting a chair or rather an icon of it, or an ex
hibition of the act of sitting down, or whatever. In short, we have to present
something perceivable, which is such that, if one responds to it appropri
ately, it will thereby reveal, disclose, make manifest, make apparent, make
experientially present or available something about chairs. We do not see
chairs, but icons or images of something supposed to be a chair, rather
than a hallucination. At the same time, what we assume to see if we see
a chair is not an image because we do react to images differently than to
things perceived. We sit down, for instance, on chairs but not on images of
chairs. Thus what is required is a methodical activity or method of inquiry
in order to find out about the objectivity and truth of our representations
and this method must be recursively organized (which fact provides epis
temology with the flavor of paradox). Observation, for instance, is always
theory laden, and experiments are always guided by theoretical consider
ations. But experimentation certainly goes beyond the purely intellectual
approach of a theoretician. There is not one science, which can hope to
ascertain true knowledge without some kind of experimentation.

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14 MICHAEL OTTE
This coin has a reverse, however, stating that the hypothetic-deductive

method is indispensable for any scientific inquiry. The Norwegian philoso
pher Foellesdal, for instance, has put forward the thesis that the so-called
hermeneutic method of the humanities is the hypothetic-deductive method
"applied to meaningful material (i.e. to texts, works of art, actions, etc.)"
(Foellesdal, 1979, p. 320). Because our relations to reality are mediated
by signs, even our perceptual judgments, constituting the basis of all our
knowledge, are of essentially hypothetical nature. They are formed by a pro
cess of generalization; Peirce calls this process "abduction", or hypothetical
inference. "Abduction is the process of forming an explanatory hypothesis.
It is the only logical operation which introduces any new idea; for induc
tion does nothing but determine a value, and deduction merely evolves the
necessary consequences of a pure hypothesis" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958,
p. 5.171). Even Godel, being a convinced Platonist, nevertheless argues in
favor of the necessity of introducing always new hypotheses and axioms
and of justifying them in terms of "success", that is "fruitfulness in conse
quences" (Godel, 1947), rather than merely in terms of a priori intuition.
Mathematics, being "the study of what is true of hypothetical states
of things" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 4.233) is fundamental for every
positive science, in particular, for the "first" positive science, namely phe
nomenology. "Phenomenology ascertains and studies the kinds of elements
universally present... at any time to the mind in any way" (Peirce, 1931?
1935,1958, CP 1.186). Mathematics or rather mathematical deduction me
diates between the processes of intuition and abduction on the one hand and
inductive verification on the other. Mathematics is thus, because of its me
diating character, particularly apt of being conceived of in semiotic terms.
Perhaps you will ask me, Peirce says in his Lectures on Pragmatism of
1903,
whether it is possible to conceive of a science which should not aim to declare that
something is positively or categorically true. I reply that it is not only possible to
conceive of such a science, but that such science exists and flourishes, and Phe
nomenology, which does not depend upon any other positive science, nevertheless
must, if it is to be properly grounded, be made to depend upon the Conditional or
Hypothetical Science of Pure Mathematics, whose only aim is to discover not how
things actually are, but how they might be supposed to be (Peirce, 1931-1935,
1958, CP 5.40).
I believe that this aspect of mathematics, its functionality as a science

of mediation should be a major concern for every mathematical educator.
Rather than stressing the formal nature of mathematical deduction, one
should emphasize its importance for evaluating the fertility and coherence
of our intuitions and hypotheses.
Mathematics is essentially diagrammatical thinking.

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Diagrams and diagrammatoidal figures are intended to be applied to the better

understanding of states of things, whether experienced, or read of, or imagined.
Such a figure cannot, however, show what it is to which it is intended to be applied;
nor can any other diagram avail for that purpose. The where and the when of the
particular experience, or the occasion or other identifying circumstance of the
particular fiction to which the diagram is to be applied, are things not capable of
being diagrammatically exhibited. Describe and describe and describe, and you
never can describe a date, a position, or any homaloidal quantity.If a diagram
cannot do it, algebra cannot: for algebra is but a sort of diagram; and if algebra
cannot do it, language cannot: for language is but a kind of algebra (Peirce, 1931
1935, 1958, CP 3.419).
There is no direct way from language and representation to reality.

No specification of predicates can define an individual entity. Linguistic
descriptions do not per se attach to the world. Reference to an object must
ultimately at least be of a causal and ostensive kind, which is realized within
the representational activity by indexical signs.
The meanings of words ordinarily depend upon our tendencies to weld together
qualities and our aptitudes to see resemblances, or, to use the received phrase, upon
associations by similarity; while experience is bound together,..., by forces acting
upon us, or, to use an even worse chosen technical term, by means of associations
by contiguity (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 3.419).
Peircean semiotics accordingly introduces two types of non-symbolic

signs, icons and indices. Differently from symbols these other signs seem
to bear the same relations to their objects "whether they were interpreted
as doing so or not.The difficulty is that resemblances and natural
correlations are ubiquitous. Every two entities bear some likeness to each
other, and some correspondence in fact. Yet we do not consider every object
a sign, much less an icon or index of every other_Something is an icon
or index only if it functions as such.But being taken to signify requires
an interpretant. So icons and indices, like conventional signs, are symbols.
? Icon, index and symbol threaten to collapse into an undifferentiated
heap" (Elgin, 1997, p. 143).
This argument is not conclusive. A sign may refer to an interpreting
thought without this relation of reference being necessarily established
by social convention. Metaphors, for example, are a kind of icons, which
are highly creative and original. A sign functions as a sign if it refers to
something different from itself, its object. But how it does so makes the
difference. And furthermore, if knowledge is to have some real value, there
must be a distinction between subjective belief and objective content of
cognitive activity. Elgin, in fact, shows unintentionally that we must employ
a pragmatic notion of sign, rather than characterizing our representational
systems exclusively in terms of semantics and syntax. The pragmatic view

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16 MICHAEL OTTE
means to understand representational systems as means and contexts of

cognitive activity.
It is impossible, as was said already, that everything means something.
Not everything in the world is reasonable and intelligible. There exist pure
feelings or brute facts that seem to escape any reasonable explanation.
We therefore cannot describe or explain everything. Reality or the world in
which we live essentially consists thus of two types of entities, signs, which
have meaning, and objects, which represent pure actual existence. Existents
can react with other existents, but they do not mean anything. Meanings,
in contrast, are possibles, that is, their objectivity lies in the future. The
meaning of a natural law or of a mathematical axiom, for example, is to be
seen in its fertility with respect to potential future applications.
While in empirical science there is a quite natural distinction between
facts and possibilities or things and laws (relations), relations seem to be
all-pervasive in mathematics. The distinction between objects and rela
tions therefore becomes extremely relative. Within mathematics there is no
absolutely fundamental ontological level, and there are thus no names of
concrete empirical objects or data. Still, mathematics is not an analytical
science from concepts, but rather has always also to employ particular in
stances of those. In the argument of a geometrical proof, for instance, we
use over and again phrases like, 'triangle A is congruent to triangle B', or
'the straight line c is parallel to line d', or 'point X coincides with point Y'.
etc. Or, stated in semiotical terms, indices are indispensable in mathematics
also.
To conceptually identify particular objects in a Leibnizean manner
would require at least infinite definitions (but already the natural num
bers, for example, cannot, as Skolem has shown, following insights from
Godel's work on the incompleteness phenomenon, be characterized even
by an infinite number of logical axioms). Therefore, indices and icons,
that is non-symbolic thought signs, as Peirce had called them, are essen
tial to introduce anything new into mathematical discourse. Mathematics
teachers very often dislike iconic representations, believing them to be con
fusing and not controllable with respect to their impact (Otte, 1983, p. 20).
This might be as true as it is essential, if something new is to be learned.
Mathematical and logical reasoning are impossible without observation,
perception and intuitive generation of new ideas and hypotheses.
Semiotic epistemology starts from the assumption that the essential fea
tures of an act of imaginative creation consist in seeing an A as a B: A = B.
This act is an act of abduction that is, of hypothetical inference. That which
is represented by A and B is sometimes called an "idea". Leibniz uses in
order to illustrate the expressive faculty of ideas the metaphor of perspec
tive representation "somewhat as the same town is variously represented

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according to the different positions of an observer" {Discourse on Meta

physics, part 9). This is a lucky illustration because it indicates that there
must be a common "world" to which these different perspectives belong
and this world is not just a logical system. Logical or mathematical deduc
tion unfolds the consequences of a set of premises and always presupposes
perceptual judgments. And abduction is but "a gradation of that which in
its highest perfection we call perception" (Peirce, 1967, MS 316).
While the painters formulated the problem of perspective as a relation
between the picture and reality, Desargues formulated it as a problem of
the relation between two pictures" (Kvasz, 1998, p. 143) and he thus led
mathematics on the road towards generalization. Generalization is, how
ever, insufficient as a guide when mathematical application is concerned. In
application mathematical generalizations must be related to the constraints
introduced by concrete activities like measurement, and must conceive of
geometrical relations in a way compatible with the intended concrete ac
tion. This point has been brought forward forcefully by Albert Einstein, for
example, when describing the development of relativity theory (see Ein
stein's Berlin lecture before the Prussian Academy of Sciences, January
27, 1921: Geometry and Experience).
In mathematics, one transforms a representation into others and looks
permanently for new representations of the same. Desargues had already
conceived of mathematics in such a way. A mathematical object, such as
'number' or 'function', does not exist independently of the totality of its
possible representations, but it must not be confused with any particular
representation, either. Mathematical objectivity depends on over - deter
mination, which simply means that there must be more than one way of
getting anywhere. Equality and difference thus make up the subject matter
of mathematics, as already Grassmann had affirmed (Otte, 1989). There
fore, even in mathematics we can act on the thing itself rather than merely
upon one description of it (an example from computer geometry is provided
in Otte, 2003a, 206 ff). One may have a certain task in mind of a concept
that suits one best at the moment. Afterwards one will have to demonstrate
that one's results are invariant with respect to the chosen representation.
Epistemology is about the relationship between these types of entities,
objects and signs. As all general phenomena are fundamentally semiotic
entities, while singular phenomena are not intrinsically signs, we could
also say that epistemology is concerned with the relation between the sin
gular and the general. In this way generalization appears as a fundamental
problem of epistemology and of education. To know means to relate a par
ticular experience to a concept (a predicate) or to a rule (a law), as there is
no reasoning from particulars to particulars. Thus, to know implies, in any
case, to relate a particular to a general, it means to generalize. A particular

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18 MICHAEL OTTE
or individual, by being represented and by thereby being transformed into

a sign, becomes a general and "that what is general is of the nature of a
general sign" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 1.26).
The essence of anything is the essence of a representation of that thing.
This follows directly from the fact that our relations to reality are mediated
by signs or semiotic processes. Stated differently, it means that there are no
essences in the absolute Platonic sense. Against that one should also note
that there always exist constraints on an interpretation of a sign, constraints
that depend on the context at hand. Knowledge is thus a living process.
The characteristics of whatever exists depend on the system of
representations through which it is signified. Events or situations are
always concrete and particular. When we try, however, to approach them in
terms of their immediate "Firstness" (Peirce), we succeed only if there is a
recurrent or constant element present. Otherwise all that remains is a set of
objects or feelings, which we cannot grasp nor remember because we can
neither indicate nor qualify them. For instance, we may have solved a prob
lem and when we hit a second time on the very same problem situation, we
may have to solve it again from scratch, because we cannot remember how
we did it before. There normally occurs a gradual growth of our problem
solving capacities with respect to that type of problems, - learning is always
accompanied by meta-learning, that is, learning to learn. Nevertheless it
may happen that no explicitly communicable and generalizable knowledge
is produced. It is the person who has grown intellectually. These issues are
so fundamental that within mathematics itself, as it is said, there coexist
two different cultures. Such is the main thesis of a widely discussed essay
entitled "Two Different Cultures of Mathematics" by Fields medalist Tim
Gowers. Gowers addresses "the distinction between mathematicians who
regard their central aim as being to solve problems, and those who are
more concerned with building and understanding theories" (Gowers, 2000,
p. 65).
Everybody has certainly sometimes in life experienced the violent shock
an emotional conflict might produce. Therefore, the question how emo
tions and feelings can be conceived as ingredients of rationality remains
important. Thinking is decision making and as such demands judgments
about the overall circumstances. Now feelings are the sensors to make
such judgments. Emotions disrupt reasoning and are therefore detrimental
in scientific work, it is said. This seems true, but equally certain is the fact
that reduction in emotion may also constitute irrational behavior. Damasio
has in his book Descartes' Error brought forward ample evidence for the
importance of emotion (see Damasio, 1996).
There is a view in semiotics, sometimes called "existential semiotics"
(Tarasti, 2000), or "semiotic idealism", which tries to argue that the whole

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universe is basically of semiotic nature and that signs come into being only
by development out of other signs. Well, first of all such a position is not
possible in epistemology if conceived from the point of view of a limited
human subject. Secondly, one might doubt whether it is at all sound to
ignore experience that is prior to interpretation, as well as to negate the
existence of chance or contingent brute fact not governed by law.
To the individual mind, linguistic representation may appear to be an
impoverishment and falsification of the wealth of mental experiences and
intuitions. From the perspective of language and communication, however,
it seems obvious that no thought or sign can be exhausted by an individual
interpretation and experience, and is thus infinitely more complex and man
ifold than can be realized by any actualization or interpretation (Durkheim,
1995, 28, 433ff). This flexibility and complexity marks a difference be
tween a (theoretical) concept on the one hand and an ordinary tool, like a
hammer, on the other hand.
Still, however, progress of science and its history are influenced and
shaped in essential ways by the unpredictability and peculiarity of indi
vidual intuition and by particular and unexpected events. Moreover, in
epistemology as well as in logic or communication theory we have to ac
knowledge that communication and knowledge are possible only when
there is some other, which neither fuses with the subject, nor is totally dif
ferent from it. Within intuition, knowledge of the fact and knowledge of
its truth coincide. At the same time, the cognitive subject is transformed
into a medium, into a mere means of cognition. The self-reflective subject
(and also the social-communicative subject) is, however, always also an
object of thinking and communication. And to establish this complemen
tarity of means and objects, a mediating institution is indispensable. This
is conceived by the idea of sign or representation.
2. What then is a sign?
What then is a sign? The answer seems simple enough. Any concrete thing,
mark or token can be a sign as soon as it directs our attention to something
different. And there is, in fact, no sign without a concrete mark or event.
But a sign has a meaning, something a thing does not have. Toward what
are we directed by the token then? Towards the meaning or to the object
of the sign? Toward both? Does it depend on the kind of sign which of
these relationships is more important? As both these relations of a sign
are highly flexible a sign is of the highest level if it functions like a law
in its establishing connections between the signs objects and interpreting
thoughts. Such kind of signs Peirce calls symbols.

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20 MICHAEL OTTE
A sign is not a sign unless it has an impact or functions as a sign. If you

hit upon some object in the dark, this object becomes a sign. Everything
that makes a relation effective is a sign. Thus, in a first answer to our
question we might be tempted to define a sign in terms of communicative
or representational function. In order to develop the notion of meaning in
particular one has to observe how signs are received and used. But again,
a sign or a text cannot be identified with any of its functions. Neither the
function nor the interpretation of the sign can be the whole answer. A
sign also refers to something different from its immediate effects, called
its object. Now one of the important achievements of Peirce's semiotics
is his classification of non-thought signs in terms of icons and indices.
Icons are important by their content or meaning; indices because of their
objects. Indices and icons must, however, be mediated with each other to
produce general meanings and this renders the judgment or proposition
the nucleus of explicit knowledge. Any proposition, when decomposed
into its ingredients, is shown to contain at least an icon and an index.
Now signs are, in fact, used both referentially and descriptively. This is
but another expression of the complementarity of object and interpretant.
And this fact is responsible for a lot of problems in mathematical logic
and epistemology. Bertrand Russell illustrates this point by means of the
distinction he draws between names and descriptions. We have, he writes,
"two things to compare: A name, which is a simple symbol, directly des
ignating an individual which is its meaning (or referent), and having this
meaning in its own right independently of the meanings of all other words;
A description, which consists of several words, whose meanings are already
fixed, and from which results whatever is to be taken as the 'meaning' of
the description" (Russell, 1998, p. 174).
Russell believes in fact that in pure mathematics we have no real names
or indices and he defends a descriptive theory of reference and meaning.
This is a somewhat Hegelian or Leibnizean kind of view, which Peirce had
criticized on various occasions (see for example, Peirce, 1931-1935,1958,
CP 5.40).
As has been said already, no specification of predicates can define an
individual entity. A description always singles out a general or a type, rather
than a particular existent.
John Stuart Mill already proposed a view contrary to Russell's descrip
tion theory of reference, saying that "proper names" are not "connotative"
i.e. they do not have any discursive meaning that can be explained. "They
denote the individuals who are called by them; but they do not indicate or
imply any attributes as belonging to those individuals" (Mill, 1843/1884,
p. 29). Thus, a proper name refers directly to an individual and does not
have any other meaning. This is the basic "direct reference" theory. The

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meaning of a name, according to this theory, is just the entity to which it

refers. A = A, on this account, has the same meaning as A = fi, which
seems wrong and counterintuitive.
Gottlob Frege had pointed out that the same individual might have
various names, whose meanings are somewhat different. His own classic
example was that "Hesperus" is the name of the "Evening Star", while
"Phosphorus" (or "Lucifer") is the name of the "Morning Star"; but it turns
out that the Evening Star and the Morning Star are the same thing, the
planet Venus. The identity of the object, however, does not make it correct
to call Venus in the evening "Phosphorus." This implies that "Hesperus"
and "Phosphorus" are not identical in meaning.
Frege on account of this introduced the distinction between sense and
reference. In his famous essay on "Sinn undBedeutung " Frege quotes some
examples from elementary geometry. He writes: "Let a, b, c be the lines
connecting the vertices of a triangle with the midpoints of the opposite
sides. The point of intersection of a and b is then the same as the point of
intersection of b and c. So we have different designations for the same point,
and these names ("point of intersection of a and b"; "point of intersection
of b and c") likewise indicate the mode of presentation, and hence the
statement contains actual knowledge" (Frege, 1969, p. 40; our translation).
When we affirm that a triangle necessarily has a center of gravity, we seem
to refer directly to some entity, which otherwise could possibly be described
as "point of intersection of b and c".
So the intensions and extensions of mathematical terms become
relatively independent of each other, and mathematical growth depends in
no small amount on how mathematicians handle this complementarity (see
Otte, 2003a). Stated in semiotic terms: one cannot explain the development
of the symbolic, without taking into account the functioning of the more
elementary signs, icons and indices. And to do so, one has to treat the prob
lems of meaning and reference in pragmatic terms, taking human activity
as the basic notion, rather than trying to establish a direct and context-free
relationship between signs and objects. A context that has proven
particularly important in mathematics is structure. Piaget's constructive
structuralism, for instance, serves to establish (mathematical) objectivity
and meaning without reference to specifically interpreted objects.
It is clear that one can respond to a "meaningless" or arbitrary string
of symbols, uttered by a monkey by randomly uttering any set of equally
patternless signs as a purported interpretant for the first utterance, and this
can set forth another equally senseless string, etc. Thus meaning certainly
must be associated with constraints or "objective" laws and with struc
ture and redundancy, and ultimately with application. The constraints of
spelling and syntax, for instance, are first prerequisites for free expression

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22 MICHAEL OTTE
of thought. Other such constraints are set by our faculties to perceive or

imagine something.
We might conclude our considerations about meaning so far by saying
that this notion of meaning is inseparably linked to the relationship between
general and particular, between law and application, or habit and rule, or
constraints and constrained. A disposition of behavior is nothing but such
a relation, which becomes effective upon appropriate instances. Russell's
rigid separation between indices (names) and descriptions, although un
derstandable in view of the semantic paradoxes, is not feasible, because it
eliminates the objectively possible as something, which bestows continu
ity upon our thinking and feeling. Some have identified the meaning of a
sign with its "interpretant". But, as this rather esoteric terminology already
indicates, this avails to nothing because one is now forced to differentiate
between various types of interpretants.
If the sign is an intellectual symbol, its meaning is to be conceived
in terms of law or habit. A habit represents simultaneously experience of
knowledge and of its application, experience of a content and of the con
ditions of its verification. A symbol thus relates an icon with an index, that
is, an intuition with an objective experience. Consciousness of habit, says
Peirce, "is a consciousness at once of the substance of the habit, the special
case of application, and the union of the two" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958,
CP 8.304). Much of the work of modern cognitive science has assumed that
thinking is essentially symbol manipulation according to certain syntac
tical rules. One of the major problems with this conception is how formal
manipulations of symbols are applied and take on intuitive meanings.
As the application of a rule ultimately cannot itself be rule governed
again, if we do not want to end up in infinite regress habits cannot be reduced
to rules but must rather include something of a contextual nature, experi
ence or intuition or whatsoever. Habits clearly transcend consciousness,
although learning, conceived as habit-change may on occasion transform
the unconscious, or some part of the unconscious, into consciousness.
We accept Peirce's pragmatist definition of a sign as depicted in Figure 1.
Sign
Object Interpretant
Figure I.

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In contrast to the traditional dyadic models, Peirce defines a sign as

anything "that stands for something (called its object) in such a way as to
generate another sign (its interpretant or meaning)". A sign does not stand
for its object in all respects, "but in reference to a sort of idea, which I
have sometimes called the ground of the representamen. 'Idea' is here to
be understood in a sort of Platonic sense, very familiar in everyday talk"
(Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 2.228 and 4.536).
While the classical formula portrays the sign in terms of a dyadic
relationship, the Peircean definition conceives of it in terms of a tri
adic structure. The fundamental triad in Peircean semiotics is precisely
object-sign-interpretant (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 8.361). This dia
gram has a recursive structure: the sign within the sign, within the sign, etc.
ad infinitum. Thus again, a sign is not only a thing, but is also a process.
A Sign is anything, writes Peirce,
which is related to a Second thing, its Object, in respect to a Quality, in such a way
as to bring a Third thing, its Interpretant, into relation to the same Object, and that
in such a way as to bring a Fourth into relation to that Object in the same form, ad
infinitum. If the series is broken off, the Sign, in so far, falls short of the perfect
significant character. It is not necessary that the Interpretant should actually exist.
A being in futuro will suffice (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 2.92).
Nevertheless, the first rather naive approach to the question 'what is

a sign', namely at first emphasizing the peculiarities of indices and icons
respectively, has some merits as it puts the problem of the relationship
between sign and object first. We assume henceforth that reality is made
up of objects and signs, or continua and atoms, or relations and related,
and that upon characterizing and classifying signs, their relationship with
objects is the most important. A sign is, first of, all defined by the relation
to an object and this relation, which is a mere possibility, must be realized.
We thereby turn to that trichotomy of signs, which Peirce saw as the most
fundamental division of signs, and which is probably the best known to
students of the theory of signs; this is the division of signs into Icons,
Indexes, and Symbols.
Peirce states:
It has been found that there are three kinds of signs which are all indispensable in all
reasoning; the first is the diagrammatic sign or Icon, which exhibits a similarity or
analogy to the subject of discourse; the second is the Index, which like a pronoun
demonstrative or relative, forces the attention to the particular object intended
without describing it; the third or Symbol is the general name or description which
signifies its object by means of an association of ideas or habitual connection
between the name and the character signified (Peirce, 1931-1935,1958, CP 1.369).

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24 MICHAEL OTTE
3. Peirce' basic categories
To illustrate and elucidate the hierarchy of signs outlined in the last section
we have to mention Peirce' universal categories. The heart of the Peircean
phenomenology is Peirce's system of categories; the categories are basic
to the understanding not only of Peirce's concept of normative science, but
of his theory of signs, and indeed of his thought as a whole.
For Aristotle, for Kant, and for Hegel, a category is an element of phenomena of the
first rank of generality. It naturally follows that the categories are few in number,
just as the chemical elements are. The business of phenomenology is to draw up a
catalogue of categories and prove its sufficiency and freedom from redundancies
(Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP5.43).
Peirce then tries to capture the structure of our possible experience by

three fundamental categories, which he calls, in order to avoid premature
reification, by completely abstract names Firstness, Secondness and Third
ness. "I was long ago (1867) led", writes Peirce, "after only three or four
years' study, to throw all ideas into the three classes of Firstness, of Sec
ondness, and of Thirdness. This sort of notion is as distasteful to me as to
anybody; and for years, I endeavored to pooh-pooh and refute it; but it long
ago conquered me completely. Disagreeable as it is to attribute such mean
ing to numbers, and to a triad above all, it is as true as it is disagreeable.
... I should define, Firstness, Secondness, and Thirdness thus:
Firstness is the mode of being of that which is such as it is, positively
and without reference to anything else.
Secondness is the mode of being of that which is such as it is, with
respect to a second but regardless of any third."
A first is something as it appears in itself, like a sensation or feeling.
A second is like an act of will without a motivation or, like something as
it appears in reaction to something else, but without any intelligibility or
mediation.
Thirdness is mediation, is the mode of being of that which is such as
it is, in "bringing a second and first into relation to each other" (Peirce,
1931-1935, 1958, CP 8.328). And on a different occasion he writes:
Thirdness is the triadic relation existing between a sign, its object and the inter
preting thought,... considered as constituting the mode of being of a sign.
Firstness is, among other things, the category of feeling, by which Peirce
means "an instance of that kind of consciousness which involves no anal
ysis, comparison or any process whatsoever, nor consists in whole or in
part of any act by which one stretch of consciousness is distinguished from
another, which has its own positive quality which consists in nothing else,
and which is of itself all that it is, however it may have been brought about;

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so that if this feeling is present during a lapse of time, it is wholly and

equally present at every moment of that time_A feeling, then, is not an
event, a happening, a coming to pass,... a feeling is a state, which is in its
entirety in every moment of time as long as it endures" (Peirce, 1931-1935,
1958, CP 1.306).
Firstness, the category of feeling or quality in this sense, such as the
color of red for instance, "that mere quality, or suchness, is not in itself
an occurrence, as seeing a red object is; it is a mere may-be. Its only
being consists in the fact that there might be such a peculiar, positive,
suchness in a phaneron" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 1.304). A First
is inevitably followed by a Second, because we are corporal individual
beings within a reactive world. Suppose one wants to solve a mathematical
problem or one has to make a decision. There must be first a motive, which
produces a wish or a feeling. A feeling without a clear motive does not
lead to productive action. On second thoughts one begins to wonder about
possible obstacles. But what counts in the end when making the decision
is a viable decision procedure. The motive must be clear and strong
enough to keep the struggle between emotion and obstacles in balance.
Thus, it is a Third! Or stated differently, the motive, which is sometimes
called the object of cognitive activity, mediates between feelings and
obstacles. These latter can never come alone if there is a real cognitive
activity.
Firstness is preeminently the category of the prereflexive. The difficult
thing in talking about firsts is that when we recognize that something is
grasped as a first, its Firstness as Firstness effectively evanesces. When
we try to approach something in terms of its immediate "Firstness", we
succeed only if there is a recurrent or constant element present. Otherwise
all that remains is a set of objects or feelings, which remain elusive and
cannot be neither grasped nor remembered by themselves.
Although the entire consciousness at any one instant is nothing but a feeling,
yet psychology can teach us nothing of the nature of feeling, nor can we gain
knowledge of any feeling by introspection, the feeling being completely veiled
from introspection, for the very reason that it is our immediate consciousness
(Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 1.310).
Seconds are particular existents, events or actions and reactions, unique

in space and time. For example, specific observations as recorded in a
laboratory, whether in physics or psychology, are seconds. While Firstness
is essentially atemporal, Secondness provides the discrete, distinguishable
points, which we order by the time sequence. The brute thereness, the
unquestionable existence of seconds might lead us to think of Secondness
as the category of the "really" real, at least as long as we believe that reality

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26 MICHAEL OTTE
is made up from particular objects or existents, as it is common in everyday

thinking. But things have no meaning, as was said already. Therefore, this
common view of the world is very detrimental for mathematical education
and learning. The problem of mathematical education is not just rigor or
logical objectivity, but meaningfulness.
It seems appropriate to distinguish between different kinds of being
or reality. Reality, Peirce held, is more than a matter of discrete events
occurring at given points in space-time. Reality is also a matter of the
relations between events, and here is where his category of Thirdness enters.
Thirdness is the category of law, of habit, of continuity, of relatedness and
representation, for Peirce affirms "that the idea of meaning is irreducible
to those of quality and reaction" (Peirce, 1931-1935,1958, CP 1.345), that
is, it is irreducible to Firstness and Secondness.
It is very important to note that Peirce draws a clear distinction between
existence and reality, the particular and the general, or between objects and
laws, without cutting the essential relationship between the two. "I should
not wonder if somebody were to suggest that perhaps the idea of a law
is essential to the idea of one thing acting upon another. But surely that
would be the most untenable suggestion in the world considering ... that
no law of nature makes a stone fall, or a Ley den jar to discharge, or a steam
engine to work" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 1.323). Natural laws must
be applied and that involves methods of verification.
Thus in the world there are objects - for "we are continually bumping
up against hard fact" as Peirce says - as well as signs or representations,
Seconds and Thirds. For "thirdness is only a synonym for Representation"
(Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 5.105).
Let me illustrate the three categories by means of a simple but, with
respect to mathematics, fundamentally important example, namely with
respect to the following diagram: x = 2. Like A = B it is a diagram with
the iconic character prevailing. This is, however, only a very preliminary
characterization, because any sign having a tripartite structure can be clas
sified according to Peirce' categories with respect to each of its aspects,
the sign in itself, its relation to its object and its relation to the interpre
tant. "x = 2" might then in accordance with this procedure perhaps be
classified as a "Rhematic Iconic Legisign" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP
2.243ff). But this again depends on the circumstances under which this
diagram is used, and we certainly cannot go into such a detailed analysis
here.
"=" is a first; it is an icon of an idea. With respect to mathematical activ
ity it is the motive or object of that activity. Robert Recorde (1510-1558)
introduced this icon, commenting that "nothing could be more equal". And
"2" is a name. But it is a name of what? Of a Platonic idea, the majority

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of mathematicians might answer. As Godel says: "Two is the notion under

which fall all pairs and nothing else. There is certainly more than one no
tion in the constructivistic sense satisfying this condition, but there might
be one common 'form' or 'nature' of all pairs" (Godel, 1944, p. 138). This
form or nature or idea is an hypostatic abstraction and it is the 'ground'
of a sign, as Peirce would say. Ideas or icons are indeterminate but further
determinable in a variety of ways. "2 can be anything", wonders the young
child at school.
If x is a name, "x = 2" states a fact, a contingent fact, and as such it
is a Second. Secondness is expressed by the syntactic rules of arithmetic,
for instance, when one tries to verify a fact like, for example, 2 + 2 = 4.
But when "jc = 2" is considered as a propositional function, where x is a
mere placeholder it is a First again. If "x = 2" is being used in the course
of a concrete investigation where "%" has some concrete meaning, - being
an objectual variable - it is a Third or a symbol.
We may also note explicitly that a proposition can be a Second or a
Third. A proposition considered as part of deductive argument states a
fact and is thus to be seen as a Second, rather than as a Third. One wants
to prove a theorem and all the propositions one uses in the course of
the argument are reactive to that goal. The proof is a representation that
has to be applied. It is true, as one of the reviewers has mentioned, that
"many more things could be said of x = 2". One could even write a whole
paper on "=". My only purpose here was to point out that there is always
the danger of reification. The categories are analytical tools, rather than
names of things. Didactics of mathematics supplied, about 50-40 years
ago, for instance, a very large number of logical analyses of equational
forms, without ever reaching the mere distinction between objectual
and substitutional variables; a distinction which is very important in
mathematics.
If we consider the services that the different elements of argumentation
render us we could say that a term or a word usually serves to evoke an
idea, and is thus to be considered an Icon, whereas propositions are used to
state facts and thus are Indices. Now an argument considered functionally
serves to establish a certain train of thought or a habit of dealing with certain
matters intellectually and thus it must be called a Symbol. As Peirce writes
in 1906 in his Prolegomena to an Apology of Pragmatism:
When an Argument is brought before us, there is brought to our notice... a process
whereby the Premises bring forth the Conclusion, not informing the Interpreter of
its Truth, but appealing to him to assent thereto. This Process of Transformation,
which is evidently the kernel of the matter, is no more built out of Propositions
than a motion is built out of positions. The logical relation of the Conclusion to
the Premises might be asserted; but that would not be an Argument, which is

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28 MICHAEL OTTE
essentially intended to be understood as representing what it represents only in

virtue of the logical habit which would bring any logical Interpreter to assent to it
(Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 4.572).
Any ordinary word, as 'give', 'bird', 'marriage', ... is applicable to whatever

may be found to realize the idea connected with the word; it does not, in itself,
identify those things. It does not show us a bird, nor enact before our eyes a giving
or a marriage, but supposes that we are able to imagine those things, and have
associated the word with them (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 2.298).
Therefore, from a genetic point of view, we might understand a word like

"bird" as a sentence like "This is a bird" or whatever because we certainly
cannot grasp the meaning of such a sign without evoking some specific
perceptual experience of a bird. Take, for instance, "it rains." Here, Peirce
writes, "the icon is the mental composite photograph of all the rainy days
the thinker has experienced. The index, is all whereby he distinguishes that
day, as it is placed in his experience. The symbol is the mental act whereby
[he] stamps that day as rainy" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 2.438).
4. Indices and icons
We are back now to the theory of signs and to the three fundamental types
of signs Peirce mentions: Icons, Indices and Symbols. Peirce's original
achievement is, in fact, to be seen in his characterization of cognition as a
semiotic process and in his idea of basing the very notion of sign on the
three categories of phenomenology.
There seems something puzzling here. On the one hand, the symbol ap
pears as the fundamental level of perception and cognition (in the same
manner as the sentence is the natural unit of linguistic representation
(Townsend/Bever, 2001), or the proposition represents the basic level of
knowledge). On the other hand, when searching for the non-intellectual
roots of cognition and semiosis, the non-symbolic signs are worth consid
ering, and we have had the opportunity to stress this at various occasions
already. We cannot understand the growth of knowledge when taking into
account only the symbolic.
Mathematics is not to be reduced to conceptual thinking and language,
but is essentially to be conceived of as an activity, and therefore the notions
of icon and index become fundamentally important. As far as mathematics
is concerned, indexicality is what in particular makes the semiotic approach
unavoidable, because it helps to solve the riddle of mathematical objects.
And it is, in fact, sometimes claimed that it is with his notion of index "that
Peirce is at once novel and fruitful" (Seboek, 1995, p. 223). Peirce saw,
Seboek continues, "as no one before him had, that indication (pointing,

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ostension, deixis) is a mode of signification as indispensable as it is irre

ducible".
One might think, Peirce himself writes
that there would be no use for indices in pure mathematics, dealing, as it does,
with ideal creations, without regard to whether they are anywhere realized or
not. But the imaginary constructions of the mathematician, and even dreams, so
far approximate to reality as to have a certain degree of fixity, in consequence
of which they can be recognized and identified as individuals. In short, there is a
degenerate form of observation which is directed to the creations of our own minds
- using the word observation in its full sense as implying some degree of fixity
and quasi-reality in the object to which it endeavors to conform. Accordingly, we
find that indices are absolutely indispensable in mathematics (Peirce, 1931-1935,
1958, CP 2.305).
The indices occurring in pure mathematics refer to entities or objects

that belong to a model, rather than to "the real world". They may thus be
considered as some sort of degenerate indices. If one endorses a realistic
view of logic and considers mathematics as a part of logic, as Russell does,
for instance, "mathematical existence" becomes somewhat of a problem.
The propositional function "jc is a bird" or "x = 2", or "x is red", for
example, is a sign which cannot be spoken of as being true or false until the
variable is taken as an index of something existing. Russell on the contrary
believes that "Existence is essentially a property of a propositional function.
It means that the propositional function is true in at least one instance"
(Russell, 1998, p. 233). When one thinks that tigers exist one does not
think, according to this view, of certain feline objects each of which has
the property of existence, rather one thinks of a concept having instances.
Or stated in Russell's terms: To say that tigers exist is to say, that "jc is a
tiger" is sometimes true. Existence then becomes some sort of second-order
predicate, rather then being used as a predicate.
Russell's propositional attitude implies that we may speak of existents
only if we have a description or definition of them. This kind of Leibnizian
ism served Russell to deal with the paradoxes of set theory, but it transforms
mathematics into a purely conceptual analytical science without objective
facts. The mathematician uses, in fact, uses "exists" as a predicate, but
uses it relative to a model or an intended application. A model is, however,
in general not presented in conceptual terms or in terms of propositional
functions. The model-theoretical view is obviously not possible without
the iconic. The complex number plane, for example, is an iconic represen
tation or a metaphor, which has proved indispensable for the development
of the number concept. The "arithmetization" of pure mathematics, which
occurred in the 19th and 20th centuries, would not have been possible with
out it. "The development of the notion of model and the emergence of the

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30 MICHAEL OTTE
idea of truth have gone largely hand in hand in our century" (Hintikka,
1997, p. 29).
Again the question arises whether we use our terms or words or signs
primarily referentially or descriptively and we come to the conclusion again
that the complementarity of intensional and referential use of signs provides
an essential orientation as well as a fundamental problem. This comple
mentarity is somewhat clarified by considering Peirce's introduction of
iconic and indexical signs.
A sign per se is a First, a qualisign as Peirce calls it. A qualisign is a
quality, which is a sign. It cannot actually act as a sign until it is embodied;
but the embodiment has nothing to do with its character as a sign. An index
or a symbol, for instance, obviously cannot be a qualisign (Peirce, 1931?
1935, 1958, CP 2.248). If considered in isolation, a sign is just a quality.
Perceiving it, you may have an idea of what it means just to you. A sign by
Firstness is an icon "an image of its object, and more strictly speaking, can
only be an idea," says Peirce (Peirce, 1931-1935,1958, CP 2.276). A sign
referring to an object or fact does so by means of a contrast or Secondness,
because an object or fact as such has no meaning, it represents nothing but
isolated particular existence. This implies that all signs necessarily "partake
of Secondness" (Sebeok, 1995, p. 229), as well as that "it would be difficult
if not impossible, to instance an absolutely pure index, or to find any sign
absolutely devoid of the indexical quality" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP
2.306). Peirce calls seconds that are signs Sinsigns. A Sinsign (where the
syllable sin is taken as meaning "being only once," as in single, simple,
Latin semel, etc.) is an actual existent thing or event, which is a sign. It can
only be so through its meaning which depends on some qualities; so that it
involves a qualisign, or rather, several qualisigns.
The sign as a symbol then is a Third insofar as its mode of being "consists
in the existence of replicas destined to bring its interpreter into relation to
some object" (Peirce, 1976, NEM, vol. IV, p. 297). A symbol is itself a
kind and not a single thing (Peirce, 1967, MS 404).
A symbol is a conventional sign which being attached to an object signifies that

object has certain characters. But a symbol, in itself, is a mere dream; it does not
show what it is talking about. It needs to be connected with its object. For that
purpose, an index is indispensable. No other kind of sign will answer the purpose
(Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP4.56).
The symbol is the most important and the most difficult to understand.
"Since symbol-using appears at a late stage, it is presumably a highly
integrated form of simpler animal activities. It must spring from biological
needs, and justify itself as a practical asset. Man's conquest of the world
undoubtedly rests on the supreme development of his reactions by the

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interpolation of symbols in the gaps and confusions of direct experience,

and by means of 'verbal signs' to add the experiences of other people to
his own" (Langer, 1996, p. 29).
As has been said, any proposition could be interpreted as a symbol.
For instance: "This rose is red". The symbol itself is just the relationship
between "Rose" and "Redness". It is the copula of the sentence and it
represents a possibility because there are roses which are not red. It is
impossible to find a proposition so simple as not to have reference to two
signs an indexical and an iconic. As in the case of names and predicates, we
should also certainly avoid reifying a symbol, however, and not identify
it with a proposition, a concept, a thought, a rule, or whatever. What is
important with respect to the symbol is its Thirdness, its mediating function
or law-like character.
A regular progression of one, two, three may be remarked in the three orders of
signs, Icon, Index, Symbol. The Icon has no dynamical connection with the object
it represents; it simply happens that its qualities resemble those of that object, and
excite analogous sensations in the mind for which it is a likeness. But it really
stands unconnected with them. The index is physically connected with its object;
they make an organic pair, but the interpreting mind has nothing to do with this
connection, except remarking it, after it is established' (Peirce, 1931-1935,1958,
CP 2.299). If smoke is understood to be a sign of fire, then this sign is an indexical
sign, for 'the index ... forces the attention to the particular object intended without
describing it (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 1.369).
It must however be taken as a sign, rather than as a physical matter.

Indices and Icons could be seen as mere objects or events. Taken as signs
they cry for the symbolic to be complete. The symbol is connected with its
object by virtue of a disposition of the symbol-using mind, without which
no such connection would exist. And this disposition is established by a
convention. The essential thing about the symbol is not, however, that it is
established by convention, but that there is a disposition and a habit, which
become objective and constitute a relation between symbol and object. This
introduces a fixation into our views on reality which is indispensable for
hypostatic abstraction. Peirce himself writes:
A Symbol incorporates a habit, and is indispensable to the application of any

intellectual habit, at least. Moreover, Symbols afford the means of thinking about
thoughts in ways in which we could not otherwise think of them. They enable us,
for example, to create Abstractions, without which we should lack a great engine of
discovery. These enable us to count; they teach us that collections are individuals
(individual = individual object), and in many respects they are the very warp of
reason.Since symbols rest exclusively on habits already definitely formed
but not furnishing any observation even of themselves, and since knowledge is
habit, they do not enable us to add to our knowledge (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958,
CP 4.531).

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32 MICHAEL OTTE
Let us turn now once more to these other types of signs, Icons and
Indices. The key feature of an Icon is that it bears a resemblance of
some sort to its object, "whether any such Object actually exists or not"
(Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 2.247). The resemblance may be the ex
treme likeness of a photograph (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 2.281), or it
may be subtler. Under any circumstances "each Icon partakes of some
more or less overt character of its Object" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958,
CP 4.531).
This partaking can be of a complex sort: Particularly deserving of notice
are icons in which the likeness is aided by conventional rules. Thus, an
algebraic formula is an icon, rendered such by the rules of commutation,
association, and distribution of the symbols. It may seem at first glance that
it is an arbitrary classification to call an algebraic expression an icon; that
it might as well, or better, be regarded as a compound conventional sign.
But it is not so.
For a great distinguishing property of the icon is that by the direct observation
of it other truths concerning its object can be discovered than those which suffice
to determine its construction' (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 1.179). Here again
the distinctive character of the icon is indicated, namely that it is the only sign
by which we can enlarge our knowledge. All icons, Peirce states in an unpub
lished manuscript, 'from mirror-images to algebraic formulae, are much alike,
committing themselves to nothing at all, yet are the source of all our information.
They play in knowledge a part iconized by that played in evolution according to
Darwinian theory by fortuitous variations in reproduction (Peirce, 1967, MS 694,
SEM I, 429).
Once an icon is set down, inferences about it become inferences about

the object, insofar as it is iconic. A mathematical figure of speech would be
to say that the icon is a mapping of one representation on to another. The
reader might be reminded of the achievements of Desargues, mentioned in
Section 1. We have employed a mathematical analogy in speaking of icons;
the reverse of this coin is that icons are of key importance in mathematics.
Analogy or structural similarity, for instance, plays a fundamental role in
mathematics. To better understand this "great distinguishing property" of
the icon, about which Peirce speaks one should compare it with a definition,
which is always confined to the exhibition of some rather arbitrarily selected
properties of the defined.
The mathematician who conceives of mathematics as reasoning from
concepts, then resembles very much "the man who mistook his wife for
a hat" in Oliver Sacks' case study (Sacks, 1970). This was a man, who
had, as Sacks put it, fallen from the concrete into the abstract. This person,
in fact, exhibited an extremely abstract attitude, making him unable to
recognize objects or situations at a glance. He would rather have to seek

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MATHEMATICAL EPISTEMOLOGY FROM A PEIRCEAN SEMIOTIC POINT OF VIEW 3 3
out, and guess from, particular features, and occasionally his guesses were
absurdly wrong.
His mistakes were often so ingenious, they could as well be qualified as
bold speculations, like in the case of an abstract mathematician. He would
see, for instance, faced with a heap of sand, not just this sand, but would say:
"I see water and a little guest-house with its terrace on the water. People are
dining out there on the terrace. I see colored parasols here and there". The
absence of specific properties or features in the actual picture had driven
him to imagine all this. Abstract shapes or definitions presented no problem
to this man but the fuzziness of any real situation did. He would at times
not even recognize his wife when he was not attentive to the properties
he had stored in memory about her. He lived in some kind of Russelian
universe, where existence can be ascribed only to those things that have
been characterized explicitly.
Icons are so completely substituted for their objects as hardly to be
distinguished from them. Such are the diagrams of algebra and geometry.
Diagrams are essentially icons and icons or images are particularly well
suited to make graspable and conceivable the possible and potential rather
than the actual and factual. Mathematics has always and again been called
the "science of the possible", or of the logically possible and to verify
whether some combination of assertions is consistent or logically possible
it must be "visualized", because the difficulty lies in the interaction between
the various affirmations, rather than in the particular meanings as such.
No analysis of conceptual meanings will in general answer the question
of whether two different relational statements or derivations amount to the
same or not.
The Icon does not stand unequivocally for this or that existing thing, as the Index
does. Its Object may be a pure fiction, as to its existence. Much less is its Object
necessarily a thing of a sort habitually met with. But there is one assurance that
the Icon does afford in the highest degree. Namely, that which is displayed before
the mind's gaze - the Form of the Icon, which is also its object - must be logically
possible (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 4.531).
As there are no relations without relata - no Secondness without First

ness - a mathematical diagram always contains indices as parts of the iconic
representation. But also insofar as it has a general signification, a diagram
cannot be a pure icon; "but in the middle part of our reasoning we forget
that abstractness in great measure, and the diagram is for us the very thing"
(Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 3.363).
Teachers always try to alert their pupils not to identify thing and icon
but to understand their geometrical diagrams as symbols. Just think of the
notorious general triangle. The problematic associated with such an idea

193.50.45.191 on Wed, 17 Mar 2021 09:51:03 UTC
34 MICHAEL OTTE
has been expressed by Locke when he remarked that the general idea of
a triangle on the one side is imperfect, "for it must be neither oblique nor
rectangle, neither equilateral nor scalene, but all and none of these at once".
On the other side we have a need for such general ideas "for the convenience
of communication and enlargement of knowledge" (Locke, 1894, p. 265).
With respect to mathematical thinking Berkeley already has written,
criticizing Locke's idea of a "general triangle", that "we shall acknowledge,
that an idea, which considered in itself is particular, becomes general,
by being made to represent or stand for all other particular ideas of the
same sort" (Berkeley, 1975, p. 69). Jesseph has characterized Berkeley's
philosophy of geometry by the term "representative generalization" and
he writes: "The most fundamental aspect of Berkeley's alternative (for the
Aristotelian abstractionist philosophy of mathematics, my insertion) is the
claim that we can make one idea go proxy for many others by treating it as
a representative of a kind" (Jesseph, 1993, p. 33). Herein lies, in fact, the
secret and all the difficulty of semiosis. How can a particular functionally
serve as a general? How can a particular concrete object convey general
meanings?
In geometry the general, as has been said, can only be represented by
the particular, as the pure image has no generality.
Take, for example, the circles by which Euler represents the relations of terms. They
well fulfill the function of icons, but their want of generality and their incompetence
to express propositions must have been felt by everybody who has used them.
Mr. Venn has, therefore, been led to add shading to them; and this shading is a
conventional sign of the nature of a symbol (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 3.363).
Symbolization or propositional activity picks up some particular aspect

which seems appropriate with respect to a certain problem or goal. We
might, for example, claim that what serves as a "general" idea in geometry
should be interpreted in relation to the particular purpose at hand. If, for
example one wants to prove the theorem that the three medians of any
triangle intersect at exactly one point, then an equilateral triangle serves
perfectly well as an instance of general triangle, because the claim of the
theorem does mention only concepts that are independent of distance and
angle (as one can define size of area independently from length and size
of angle by means of a determinant function the definition of median is
also independent of these concepts) or, to put it differently, the conditions
of the theorem in question are invariant with respect to affine transforma
tions. On the other hand it may be easier to find an argument to prove my
theorem in one case than in the other. The equilateral triangle, because of
its highly symmetrical character, is a favorable instance in the present case.
But it is the indeterminateness of the icon, which enables one to select the

193.50.45.191 on Wed, 17 Mar 2021 09:51:03 UTC
appropriate perspective. No linguistic definition does provide this freedom

and variability.
Thus, in order to understand a geometrical drawing or a mathemati
cal diagram in semiotic terms, we have to take into account not only its
concrete appearance but also its functionality, which depends on variation
and continuity. And what we do is transform our diagrams until some per
ceptual facts become undeniable. If you admit the principle, Peirce writes,
"that logic stops where self-control stops, you will find yourself obliged
to admit that a perceptual fact, a logical origin, may involve generality"
(Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 5.149). If I cannot do anything about it I
have to accept a perceptual fact as generally valid, haven't I? This lengthy
discussion about the icon leads to the conclusion that Peirce's classification
of signs could be viewed as a classification of representations of cognitive
functions or categories.
The same applies to tokens that are understood as Indices. No matter
of fact can be stated without the use of some sign serving as an index.
"In algebra, the letters, both quantitative and functional, are of this nature.
But symbols alone do not state what is the subject of discourse; and this
can, in fact, not be described in general terms; it can only be indicated.
The actual world cannot be distinguished from a world of imagination by
any description. Hence the need of pronoun and indices, and the more
complicated the subject the greater the need of them. ..." (Peirce, 1931?
1935, 1958, CP 3.363).
An icon represents by resembling. An index, on the other hand, need
bear no resemblance to its object. The key thing about an index is that it
has a direct existential connection with its object. The uses of ordinary
English are reliable in our discourse about indexes; the index finger is used
to point to something, for example. The pointing-to is a direct existential
connection with the pointed-to, and so is an index in the Peircean sense.
Indices serve identity of reference.
Swelling, pain, redness, and heat or fever are indices of inflammation.
"Indices ... furnish positive assurance of the reality and the nearness of
their objects. But with the assurance there goes no insight into the nature
of those Objects" (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 4.531). One might at
first know nothing about the disease, which the fever indicates. The more
symptoms and reactions one observes the clearer the picture becomes,
because the symptoms, like swelling or fever are not pure indices, but
provide information also. It is important to note that in general signs by
no means need be purely icons or indexes (or symbols, either). The sign in
front of a shop is indexical by its connection with the shop. But it also may
be iconic, by, say, bearing a picture of a book to indicate that the shop is a
bookstore.

193.50.45.191 on Wed, 17 Mar 2021 09:51:03 UTC
36 MICHAEL OTTE
The ordinary letters of algebra that present no peculiarities are indices. So also
are the letters A, B, C, etc., attached to a geometrical figure. Lawyers and others
who have to state a complicated affair with precision have recourse to letters to
distinguish individuals. Letters so used are merely improved relative pronouns.
Thus, while demonstrative and personal pronouns are, as ordinarily used, 'gen
uine indices', relative pronouns are 'degenerate indices'; for though they may,
accidentally and indirectly, refer to existing things, they directly refer, and need
only refer, to the images in the mind which previous words have created (Peirce,
1931-1935, 1958, CP 2.305).
'It has long been a puzzle', Peirce continues, 'how it could be that, on the one
hand, mathematics is purely deductive in its nature, and draws its conclusions
apodictically, while on the other hand, it presents as rich and apparently unending
a series of surprising discoveries as any observational science. Various have been
the attempts to solve the paradox by breaking down one or other of these assertions,
but without success. The truth, however, appears to be that all deductive reasoning,
even simple syllogism, involves an element of observation; namely, deduction
consists in constructing an icon or diagram the relations of whose parts shall
present a complete analogy with those of the parts of the object of reasoning, of
experimenting upon this image in the imagination, and of observing the result so
as to discover unnoticed and hidden relations among the parts.
... As for algebra, the very idea of the art is that it presents formulae, which can
be manipulated and that by observing the effects of such manipulation we find
properties not to be otherwise discerned (Peirce, 1931-1935, 1958, CP 3.363).
The value of an icon consists in its exhibiting the features of a state

of things regarded as if it were purely imaginary and open to arbitrary
modification. Indices, on the other hand, furnish positive assurance of the
reality and the nearness of their objects. But here also these objects may, like
the letters in algebra or in geometry belong to a completely virtual reality.
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MICHAEL OTTE
University of Bielefeld

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Mathematical Epistemology from a Peircean Semiotic Point of View

Author(s): Michael Otte

Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/25472059

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MATHEMATICAL EPISTEMOLOGY FROM A PEIRCEAN

ABSTRACT. Learning is better than knowing, generalization is more illuminating than ab

KEY WORDS: complementarity of mathematical terms, mathematical epistemology, mean

1. Some basic orientations, stated in more

What is mathematical epistemology from a semiotic point of view? Th

* Paper presented at PME 25 in Utrecht.

Educational Studies in Mathematics (2006) 61: 11-38

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All our cognitive access to reality is relative and mediated by signs,

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implies a gain in clarity, transparency and simplicity and is linked to a re

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This coin has a reverse, however, stating that the hypothetic-deductive

I believe that this aspect of mathematics, its functionality as a science

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Diagrams and diagrammatoidal figures are intended to be applied to the better

There is no direct way from language and representation to reality.

Peircean semiotics accordingly introduces two types of non-symbolic

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means to understand representational systems as means and contexts of

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according to the different positions of an observer" {Discourse on Meta

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or individual, by being represented and by thereby being transformed into

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2. What then is a sign?

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A sign is not a sign unless it has an impact or functions as a sign. If you

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meaning of a name, according to this theory, is just the entity to which it

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of thought. Other such constraints are set by our faculties to perceive or

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In contrast to the traditional dyadic models, Peirce defines a sign as

A Sign is anything, writes Peirce,

Nevertheless, the first rather naive approach to the question 'what is

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3. Peirce' basic categories

Peirce then tries to capture the structure of our possible experience by

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so that if this feeling is present during a lapse of time, it is wholly and

Seconds are particular existents, events or actions and reactions, unique

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is made up from particular objects or existents, as it is common in everyday

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of mathematicians might answer. As Godel says: "Two is the notion under

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essentially intended to be understood as representing what it represents only in

Any ordinary word, as 'give', 'bird', 'marriage', ... is applicable to whatever

Therefore, from a genetic point of view, we might understand a word like

4. Indices and icons

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ostension, deixis) is a mode of signification as indispensable as it is irre