Thure von Uexküll 1908-2004

Thure von Uexküll 1908–200

La liberté sémiotique : une force émergente

Cet article présente des arguments en vue d’une résolution des problèmes liés à la question de l’intentionnalité naturelle dans une perspective biosémiotique. En confrontant les théories de l’information au modèle évolutionniste dominant en biologie, l’auteur montre les insuffisances du réductionnisme néodarwinien dans les cas d’adaptation sans évolution au sens strict de la sélection naturelle. Ainsi est-ce l’agentivité qui se retrouve au cœur de l’interrogation : comment a-t-elle pu émerger au sein de la nature? Est-elle suffisante pour définir le vivant? Le modèle biosémiotique permet d’envisager un continuum évolutif au sein du vivant, dont le facteur de croissance, et l’effet, serait l’accroissement de la liberté sémiotique, c’est-à-dire l’amélioration, pour les organismes vivants, de leurs compétences interprétatives, liberté dont l’effet bénéfique sur la valeur sélective s’observe à travers une sophistication des modes de communication inhérents à leur organisation

Predicating from an early age: edusemiotics and the potential of children’s preconceptions

This paper aims to explain how semiotics and constructivism can collaborate in an educational epistemology by developing a joint approach to prescientific conceptions. Empirical data and findings of constructivist research are interpreted in the light of Peirce’s semiotics. Peirce’s semiotics is an anti-psychologistic logic (CP 2.252; CP 4.551; W 8:15; Pietarinen in Signs of logic, Springer, Dordrecht, 2006; Stjernfelt in Diagrammatology. An investigation on the borderlines of phenomenology, ontology and semiotics, Springer, Dordrecht, 2007) and relational logic. Constructivism was traditionally developed within psychology and sociology and, therefore, some incompatibilities can be expected between these two schools. While acknowledging the differences, we explain that constructivism and semiotics share the assumption of realism that knowledge can only be developed upon knowledge and, therefore, an epistemological collaboration is possible. The semiotic analysis performed confirms the constructivist results and provides a further insight into the teacher-student relation. Like the constructivist approach, Peirce’s doctrine of agapism infers that the personal dimension of teaching must not be ignored. Thus, we argue for the importance of genuine sympathy in teaching attitudes. More broadly, the article also contributes to the development of postmodern humanities. At the end of the modern age, the humanities are passing through a critical period of transformation. There is a growing interest in semiotics and semiotic philosophy in many areas of the humanities. Such a case, on which we draw, is the development of a theoretical semiotic approach to education, namely edusemiotics (Stables and Semetsky, Pedagogy and edusemiotics: theoretical challenge/practical opportunities, Sense Publishers, Rotterdam, 2015)

Revisiting the Gaia Hypothesis: Maximum Entropy, Kauffman’s ‘Fourth Law’ and Physiosemeiosis

Recently, Kleidon suggested to analyze Gaia as a non-equilibrium thermodynamic system that continuously moves away from equilibrium, driven by maximum entropy production which materializes in hierarchically coupled mechanisms of energetic flows via dissipation and physical work. I relate this view with Kauffman's 'Fourth Law of Thermodynamics', which I interprete as a proposition about the accumulation of information in evolutionary processes. The concept of physical work is expanded to including work directed at the capacity to work: I offer a twofold specification of Kauffman's concept of an 'autonomous agent', one as a 'self-referential heat engine', and the other in terms of physiosemeiosis, which is a naturalized application of Peirce's theory of signs. The conjunction of these three theoretical sources, Maximum Entropy, Kauffman's Fourth Law, and physiosemeiosis, shows that the Kleidon restatement of the Gaia hypothesis is equivalent to the proposition that the biosphere is generating, processing and storing information, thus directly treating information as a physical phenomenon. There is a fundamental ontological continuity between the biological processes and the human economy, as both are seen as information processing and entropy producing systems. Knowledge and energy are not substitutes, with energy and information being two aspects of the same underlying physical process