Of icons, indices and symbols
“Well,” Eve said brightly, “this way is narrow but if we squeeze we can walk three abreast.” She simultaneously implemented this goal, she in the middle, Adam to her left and the old man to her right. They all held hands.
It was strange, of course. You do not read of such things apart from fairy tales and fantasies. But this was neither. This is a true story.
Eve is real. Mobile, true, beautiful. Adam is real, forming, ready to begin. The old man is wizened, wise in his way and an true index of things we might wish to know. None of these attributes is absent from the others. Eve is always as Adam is, in some ways. Some the elements of the old man are mixed into Eve and Adam. The old man has eyes that imbibe truth and beauty. Adam has much wisdom. But he can also be influenced. Yes, they are three. And they are one, though not all unified as yet.
This is no fiction. Fiction is real in any case.
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Money talked to himself a lot. “Why has the world been ever prey to war? Why such destruction?” He pondered these questions. He accepted few answers. There were scientific means of understanding our proclivity to violence. He knew more than a few social groupings lived without war or major conflict. Sex inhibition, child neglect, drink, drugs and lethal weapons. All these had an influence. “The world is in the grip of greed and rank abuse? Why death weapons, martial parades? Why killing….
+
“We are a triad,” Eve said brightly.
“What’s that?” Adam asked, thinking he sort of knew.
“Three anything. Three elements of thought,” Eve answered. “We are a triad, I am first, Mark second, you third. Third is really what this is all about.”
“How does it make sense?” Adam asked.
“It’s how things are. The primitive triad is I, It, Thou. Or Icon, Index, Symbol. It is an inadequate way of talking about reality, about creation, about life. But when you understand it you know something many have never learned or forgotten.”
“Which is?” Mark asked.
“Where we fit in,” Eve said. “This is a good way to show the limits of words,” she added, “Words are signs.” Everything else is signs as well.”
“Signs, schwines,” Mark muttered reflectively. “I know this. You are talking about semiosis, the study of signs.”
They were trudging on. Trudging was walking when it was a bit more than we bargained for.
“How far do we have?” Mark said.
“We are too close to carry this on.” Eve said. “You are right, Mark. But it’s more than study. We don’t just study electricity or the computer. We use these things. They are like and so are we. Life that wills to live.”
“Most days,” Mark said.
“Yes,” Eve said.
Adam listened and wondered what was best about being third.
“You will thank me some day, Adam, for teaching you triads.” Eve said.
“I thank you today,” Adam said. “Teach.”
Eve laughed. Mark felt his legs protesting. Adam had started counting the cars passing on their way into the town and beyond.
“There are two, no doubt more, ways of looking at triads. One simply takes the three numbers and the related words and uses them to suggest what they are, what they mean,” Eve said. “For example, firstness applies to the vague content of the mind as it comes to consciousness. It also applies to everything that is out there whether we know it or not. Much we don’t know. Much is mystery.”
“Don’t we just naturally know things?” Adam asked.
“Absolutely,” Eve said. “More than we give ourselves credit for. But in societies where conflict is widespread, more control is necessary. We have to catch up with what should be natural.”
“That’s the most interesting thing you’ve said,” the old man said. “You believe that?”
“I think so. Yes,” Eve said. “We’ll continue this, but right now we are coming to the turn.”
She gestured to an opening in the bushes and grass a few feet ahead. When they got there she turned right into a dirt driveway and they began a climb up what was actually a foothill of the Appalachian Trail from Georgia to Maine.
