Year: 2022

FRAGMENT FROM NATURE features this weekend a chapter called ‘The translation of a sign into another system of signs’ by Korbus Morais, of University of the Free State, South Africa. This article concerns biosemiotics, and is an interesting take on communication in nature. From page 108 in this book. https://lnkd.in/dATmMuTJ View in LinkedIn

COMMUNICATION. Interestingly, the vast majority of definitions of life ignore communication. For me, life is that which processes information, communicates, replicates and evolves. Without communication a species would not survive and certainly not reproduce. https://lnkd.in/dATmMuTJ View in LinkedIn

SEMIOSIS, is the process of signification. “Semiosis is any form of activity, conduct, or process that involves signs, including the production of meaning. A sign is anything that communicates a meaning, that is not the sign itself, to the interpreter of the sign. The meaning can be intentional such as a word uttered with a specific meaning, or unintentional, such as a symptom being a sign of a particular medical condition. Signs can communicate through any of the senses, visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory, or taste.” https://lnkd.in/dryqzub8 View in LinkedIn

ORGANISMS AS TRANSLATORS. “If all meaning creation is, per definition, is translation, it means that every living organism is a translator. It further means that one needs to consider translational actions at both infraspecific and interspecific levels. It is not only humans that translate and interpret. Communication is coexistent with life, and life itself is the lower threshold of semiosis.” https://lnkd.in/dATmMuTJ View in LinkedIn

THE BEGINNINGS. “When prokaryotic cells gave up their individuality in order to live in organisms, endosemiosis (communication between cells in an organism) started. “ https://lnkd.in/dATmMuTJ View in LinkedIn

INTER- AND INTRA-COMMUNICATION. “Furthermore, individual organisms communicate with others in their species but also with others from other species.” https://lnkd.in/dATmMuTJ View in LinkedIn

BELL CURVE. “Human semiosis is to be conceptualized and understood in a continuum with other forms of semiosis.” https://lnkd.in/dATmMuTJ View in LinkedIn

MISSION CRITICAL. “If a living organism’s interpretation of the sensory environment is wrong, its survival is threatened.” https://lnkd.in/dATmMuTJ View in LinkedIn

RELATIONALITY. “Knowledge “is constructed relationally, which is why it is relative. It is constructed in relationship with an Other, be that Other a physical, or material , or biological, or social, or cultural other. Life is as much constructed as it is constructing.” https://lnkd.in/dATmMuTJ View in LinkedIn

PRODUCTS OF BIOLOGY. “One of the -- disturbing -- findings of biosemiotics is that the more we know about biology the more that we understand that the supposedly higher functions of humans (creativity, faith, understanding, language) are (also) biological in nature.” https://lnkd.in/dATmMuTJ View in LinkedIn