Dear FIS Friends, The complexity of our recent exchanges is a good thing - a kind of self-referential model of the complexity of information itself. These are some of the points that stood out for me: 1. If I follow Loet, I must accept that Information Theory is essentially a mathematical theory that requires abstractions for extension to complex contexts. But Bob says that the mathematically derived “meaning” for antibodies is a pale representation of meaning in the human context and only reflects how wanly quantitative models in general prefigure more complicated human situations. CONCLUSION: something else that is non-mathematical and non-abstract beyond IT as so defined is required to capture meaning. 2. Commenting on my note to John, Stan reminds me that without representation, as it is generally understood, there can be no discourse about the origin of semiosis, which requires the concept of indexical signs. This is of course correct. But where is it proven that semiosis is the “last word” on the origin and dynamics of meaning? Is it not possible that the usual view of the structure and function of representation is itself flawed? CONCLUSION: something else that is not semiotic is required to describe the meaning of and in reality. 3. Two aspects of the exchange between Koichiro and Loet merit attention: 1) Loet said that his point of replacing “why” with “what” did not seem necessary to him. In my mind, however, when Koichiro refers to “what is communicated by what”, he is insisting on not losing the qualitative components of the information involved. 2) Loet seems to think that the role of time is covered by the following: “Meaning is communicated incursively, whereas information is communicated recursively, that is, with reference to a previous state (t-1). Meaning is provided to the events from the perspective of hindsight, and with reference to other possible meanings (at t +1).” This suggests a background framework and a world (or model of a world) limited to a state-transition concept of time, where, in addition, only Markovian processes occur. Koichiro envisages times that are closely related to or perhaps dependent on the actual communication processes in progress. CONCLUSION: Is there anyone in the group besides me who could say that both of these perspectives are necessary for a satisfactory IT? 4. I was a little shocked at the depth of the disjunction between Rafael and Stan with regard to the former’s statement that “Trees are trees, not signs. (It’s) as simple as this”. Stan’s response, to begin with, included the phrase “trees as trees”, which is something quite different: “Trees vary according species and cultures, each of which has evolved signs to negotiate with them. ‘Trees as trees’ are a ‘scientific’ fiction insofar as they are supposed to be so without any connection to observation and interpretation.” Rafael’s phrase referred to the ipseity of trees and of something that exists before any linguistic construction (such as Peirce’s sign system). CONCLUSION: any theory of information and meaning must address that something. Thank you and best wishes, Joseph ----Ursprüngliche Nachricht---- Von: [email protected] Datum: 07.05.2011 21:30 An: <[email protected]> Betreff: [Fis] replies to several Replying to Raphael, Joseph, and Loet - Rafael Capurro to Robert, fis show details 10:13 AM (4 hours ago) well... not exactly. This is the way Hegel (and others) looked at it, discarding the 'singulars' or including them into the particulars and so creating a dialectics of the universal and the particular. Kierkegaard was not at all happy with this. What I am trying to say (quoting Octavio Paz) is nothing mystical or singular in the sense that might be part of the process of questioning ("falsifying") theories and the like. It is surely not against scientific method (fallibilistic or not) and it is not mystical (a word used by Wittgenstein as you know). Trees are trees, not signs. As simple as this. Best. Rafael Trees vary according species and cultures, each of which has evolved signs to negotiate with them. ‘Trees as trees’ are a ‘scientific’ fiction insofar as they are supposed to be so without any connection to observation and interpretation. In fact here we have a good example for consideration of nominalism. ‘Trees’ is a universal, and depends upon observation/interpretation regarding particular ones in order to be instantiated at places and times. Science believes it can transcend this by, for example, observing different species interacting with a particular kind of tree. The worm, the moth and squirrel are observed interacting with a kind of tree, under the idea that the more kinds of interactions we observe the more actual is this kind of tree. But the whole scene is a social construct; placing a universal into an increasingly inclusive observer-constructed context does not make it increasingly ‘real’ as a universal. Recording our observations and combining them with those of others merely increases the ‘scale’ of the observation. A library full of treatises on oaks does not make ‘oak’ a real universal -- unless your philosophy deems it to be so. Things-as-such are linguistic constructions. ------------------------------------------------------ Then to Joseph -- Joseph -- On Thu, May 5, 2011 at 2:59 PM, [email protected] <[email protected]> wrote: Dear John, The reference you cited looks like essential reading and I have ordered it. Thank you for calling it to our attention. I believe, also, that the conventional view of meaning leads to its erasure, and this exactly why a Derridean view of writing (and speech) is required in which erasure does not mean the total loss of meaning. As far as signs go, the area of debate is clear. A theory of signs (or sign-relations) is essential to the understanding of information and questions of reality and illusion. You believe that Peirce delivers this and I do not. The reason is that the critical fallibility, I think, is not in our representations, about which there should be no debate, but in taking signs (Peirce's icon and index) as representations in the first place. Doing this leads straight to the illusions we as realists wanted to avoid. Without this there can be no discourse about the origin of semiosis, which requires the concept of indexical signs. ------------------------------------------ Then replying to Loet -- On Sat, May 7, 2011 at 9:12 AM, Loet Leydesdorff <[email protected]> wrote: Dear Koichiro and colleagues, -snip- Meaning is provided to the events from the perspective of hindsight, and with reference to other possible meanings (at t +1). Thus, acting against the arrow of time, the communication of meaning increases the redundancy (as different from the increasing entropy to which it is coupled as a feedback mechanism). >From a semiotic perspective, a system will already have its meanings embodied >in signs. This involves foresight, even searching, as well. -snip- Your point of replacing the “why” with “by what” seems not necessary to me. The communication is carried by those units which have communicative competencies. This closes the domains operationally. You and I cannot communicate in terms of atoms, whereas molecules can. The why-question is utmost important because it involves evolutionary theorizing about the systems under study; for example, chemical versus biological evolution. I agree with this. In semiotics the 'why' is embodied in the pragmatic aspects of semiosis, resulting, in biological systems, from adaptation. The 'why' is involved up front in the seeking for information. Totally unrelated, uncalled-for, information will simply be missed (possibly at peril!). STAN Best wishes, Loet
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