Semioticsss!!!

First looking at Visual Language: Semiotics, i was intrigued of how the author noted that clothes can be semiotics. I suppose this is fairly obvious, but I reallly didn't even think about that, but I completely agree. The way people dress is usually the most basic way to communicate with other people. There is no need for any form of verbal communication, because peoples' attire is a great indicator or signifier of a person. This cannot always give an accurate representation of a person's personality though. I also really liked the comparison to the coin. The heads and tails work well to represent the concept and the sound image as one can't be with outh the other, though the coin only represents the inseperablilty of the two and not the concept behind the concept and sound image since you need to have both and having both heads and tails at the same time is not possible.
Then looking at Semiotics for Beginners: Codes, the intro regarding the golden record launched by NASA was very intereseting. I forgot that we had sent this record off into space and originally I thought it to be very well designed. But now, when I'm not in a science class, I can see how we could have put a recipee for split pee soup on it and if any aliens were to find it, it may still mean absolutly nothing to them if our references and contexts are invalid in their society. Though I suppose there is truly no universal (and i mean universal) way to communicate, especially if we are communicating with that which may not exist. Also, looking at the pictures and the associations we make with each is interesting. I glanced at the pictures first before reading each caption, and the captions basically narrated exactly how I recieved the images. It was frustrating to me that I was so predictable. The final thing I want to comment on is the references to the language of British upper class and non-upper class. I lived in England this past summer and not only was there a language variation between myslef and the Brits, but I noticed the internal differences too. One noted in this reading was that of "wireless" and "radio". I had an internship at a company where the boss was noticeably proper and he would refer to the radio as a wireless, but my younger coworkers called it a radio. I suppose there is also variations in language here in different regions of the states, but I think the international variations are more interesting. I went to a couple of concerts in London, but when I would ask about concert tickets, everyone would correct me so I would say "gig" instead of concert (which i do now habitually).

Hieroglyphs

When reading Modern Hieroglyphs, it is pretty interesting how someone can create such a simple symbol, such as those seen on bathroom doors, but have so much thought behind it. In general, I like the way positivists attempted to analyze language. Symbols should be broken down into their most simple and direct forms, though this is where the cultural differences come into play. I would think that there is a general level of intelligence across cultures, so hopefully if someone saw a symbol of an elevator with only male symbols in it, they would realize it is indeed coed elevator. I think this can relate to the reading about maps,and how there really needs to be certain contexts to extract certain meanings.
When reading about the swastika, I never previously thought about how the swastika was made into a self-fulfilling prophecy by Hitler. It did not represent what he said it did until after the Nazi's obtained the power the symbol supposedly already represented. I am trying to imagine a symbol that is currently recognized as an acceptably good one, such as an exclamation point or a smiley face, and have it totally flipped around to the point of provoking fear and hate out of those who see it. It is impressive the effect something so simple can have.

I know how to reason, i think...

I think, in general, Pierce's thoughts were correct, but I also think there are some flaws in his logic. When he discusses the photo of a zebra, he claims he could believe it to be "disagreeable" due to its physical likeness to a donkey. First, being an avid Animal Planet viewer, I do not believe a zebra to look like a donkey at all. Second, what if you do think a zebra looks like a donkey, but you happen to love donkeys and know them to be quite agreeable creatures? So in this claim, I think his arguement to be very subjective. I do like most of his examples, (though his descriptions of the 3 states of mind seem to resemble Newton's 3 laws), and I think the one regarding the richest man's house is a valid argument, also with the maps, they both mean nothing without some relative, familiar point. The final example of man being composed of living tissue seems a little under-developed, and didn't really do it for me.