Abstract

The aim of the paper is to examine some important features of Peirce's and Wittgenstein's accounts of the nature of signs. The analysis shows that there are at least four points, regarding the nature of signs, on which Peirce and Wittgenstein agree. These are: the triadic nature of signs, the presence of degenerate signs in our discourses, the role of rules in the constitution of meaning, and the indispensable role of a community in creating and maintaining the network of signs. Discovering these similarities does not mean that Peirce's and Wittgenstein's conceptions of semiotics are identical, as their authors make different assumptions about e.g. the aims of semiosis, but they nevertheless reach very similar conclusions