Francesco Bellucci - Peirce’s Speculative Grammar: Logic as Semiotics

Peirces Speculative Grammar: Logic as Semiotics offers a comprehensive, philologically accurate, and exegetically ambitious genetic account of Peirces theory of speculative grammar. The book traces the evolution of Peirces grammatical writings from his early research on the classification of arguments in the 1860s up to the complex semiotic taxonomies elaborated in the first decade of the twentieth century. It will be of interest to academic specialists working on Peirce, the history of American philosophy and pragmatism, the philosophy of language, the history of logic, and semiotics.

Francesco Bellucci is research fellow and adjunct professor at the University of Bologna. He was awarded the Peirce Society Essay Contest Prize in 2015.

Edited by Willem deVries, University of New Hampshire, USA and Henry Jackman, York University, Canada

1Intentionality and the Myths of the Given

Between Pragmatism and Phenomenology

Carl B. Sachs

2Richard Rorty, Liberalism and Cosmopolitanism

David E. McClean

3Pragmatic Encounters

Richard J. Bernstein

4Toward a Metaphysics of Culture

Joseph Margolis

5Gewirthian Perspectives on Human Rights

Edited by Per Bauhn

6Toward a Pragmatist Metaethics

Diana B. Heney

7Sellars and Contemporary Philosophy

Edited by David Pereplyotchik and Deborah R. Barnbaum

8Pragmatism and Objectivity

Essays Sparked by the Work of Nicolas Rescher

Edited by Sami Pihlstrm

9The Quantum of Explanation

Whiteheads Radical Empiricism

Randall E. Auxier and Gary L. Herstein

10Peirce on Perception and Reasoning

From Icons to Logic

Edited by Kathleen A. Hull and Richard Kenneth Atkins

11Peirces Speculative Grammar

Logic as Semiotics

Francesco Bellucci

First published 2018

by Routledge

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2018 Taylor & Francis

The right of Francesco Bellucci to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Bellucci, Francesco, 1983 author.

Title: Pierces speculative grammar : logic as semiotics / by Francesco Bellucci.

Description: 1 [edition]. | New York : Routledge, 2017. | Series: Routledge studies in American philosophy ; 11 | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2017018909 | ISBN 9780415793506 (hardback : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: Peirce, Charles S. (Charles Sanders), 18391914. | Grammar, Comparative and general. | Logic. | Semiotics.

Classification: LCC B945.P44 B366 2017 | DDC 160.92dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017018909

ISBN: 978-0-415-79350-6 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-21100-8 (ebk)

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A Carmen,
con amore

I am grateful to the Houghton Library of Harvard University for permission to quote from the Peirce manuscripts and letters in its holding. Quotes from the Writings of Charles S. Peirce (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press), vols. 15, edited by the Peirce Edition Project, Copyright 1982, 1984, 1986, 1989, 1993 by the Peirce Edition Project, are reprinted with permission of Indiana University Press. Earlier versions of parts of appeared in the Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society (volume 49, issue 2, 2013).

I am greatly indebted to Costantino Marmo, who has read a substantial portion of the manuscript with care and has disclosed to me many defects of exposition and argument. The same service has been rendered to me by Richard K. Atkins, whose criticisms and suggestions on the quasi-final draft have been very valuable. I am also indebted to Jean-Marie Chevalier, who has offered detailed comments on the first Chapter. Mistakes and shortcomings are entirely my responsibility.

I am grateful also to the many scholars, colleagues, and friends with whom I have discussed Peirce and related topics, orally and in writing, over the years, particularly to Filippo Balestra, Pietro Berti, Luisa Bianchi, James Burton, Saverio Calocero, Giorgio Coratelli, Claudia Cristalli, Andrea Di Biagio, Maria Giulia Dondero, Emanuele Fadda, Andrea Galante, Stefano Gensini, Andrea Ghizzani, Andrea Gilardetti, Giovanni Guagnelini, Robert Lane, Bruno Leclercq, Giovanni Maddalena, Francesco Marsciani, Amirouche Moktefi, Helmut Pape, Marco Pappalardo, Tommaso Redolfi Riva, Savino Claudio Reggente, and Tullio Viola. My longest-standing debts remain to Claudio Paolucci, who raised my interest in Peirce about ten years ago and has since remained a constant source of inspiration and encouragement; and to Giovanni Manetti, who supervised my doctoral work and introduced me to the problems and methods of the history of semiotics.

I should also like to thank the Archimedes Foundation for a grant that enabled me to do research at the Peirce Edition Project, Institute of American Thought, IUPUI, Indianapolis, in November 2016. At the Project I have greatly profited from Andr De Tiennes invaluable expertise and warm hospitality, for which, and for several thorough and detailed answers to my queries about textual matters, I would like to thank him very much. Special thanks are also due to Frederik Stjernfelt, for challenging and productive exchanges regarding grammatical matters and for his friendly encouragement; and to Ahti-Veikko Pietarinen, not only for generously sharing with me the manuscript of his forthcoming edition of Peirces writings on the logical graphs, but also for his friendship, his guidance, and his encouragement to write this book.

My greatest gratitude goes to my parents Rita Mansani and Mauro Bellucci, and to my sister Gianna Bellucci, for their love and care. This book is for Carmen.

F.B.
Bologna, April 2017