 To see this, imagine a chain of signs with either a first or a last sign. The final sign that terminates the semiotic process will have no interpretant; if it did, that interpretant would function as a further sign and generate a further interpretant, and the final sign would, in fact, not terminate the process. However, since any sign must determine an interpretant to count as a sign, the final sign would not be a sign unless it had an interpretant. Similarly, a first sign could not be the interpretant of a preceding sign. If it were, that previous sign would be the first sign. However, since any sign must be an interpretant of a previous sign, a first sign would not be a sign unless it was also an interpretant of a previous sign. The problem is that if we allow a final sign with no interpretant, or a first sign which is not the interpretant or some earlier sign, then we have failed signs in the semiotic process. This affects the rest of the semiotic chain causing something like a collapse of dominoes. For example, if the final sign fails to be a sign in virtue of generating no interpretant, then since that failed sign is supposed to act as the interpretant of the previous sign and function as a further sign in its own right, it has also failed to be an interpretant. The consequence of this is that the previous sign has failed to generate a proper interpretant and so failed to be a sign. The consequence of this is that…and so on. The alternative is not to countenance terminating signs. And obviously, if we cannot end the semiotic process then signs continue generating signs ad infinitum.