Aw: RE: [PEIRCE-L] Is Semiotics nonhumanist?

Sat, 30 Nov 2019 08:33:23 -0800

 
Terry, All,
 
I dont know. My question would be: Does the science about sign utterance and reception by organisms include the science about their capabilty of uttering and receiving signs, and the reasons and prerequisites for having and using this capability, or not?
And: To just call organisms signs too, isnt that a quick shot? On the other hand: To dualize it in the way of Luhmann and Maturana and Varela, by saying that the communications are one system, the communicators another, both being structurally coupled, is this a shortcut too, explaining the problem (of the epistemic cut or whatever) away by introducing the term "structural coupling"?
If the answer to both questions is "yes" (which I just suspect, but am not sure about), then I guess there is much unfinished research work still to do.
 
Best,
Helmut
 
 30. November 2019 um 02:21 Uhr
 "Terry L Rankin" <[email protected]>
wrote:

All,

 

Am I missing something or isn’t this the primary focus of biosemiotics and cybersemiotics?                                                                                             

 

Still in One Peace,

Terry

 

From: Jerry Rhee <[email protected]>
Sent: Friday, November 29, 2019 5:22 PM
To: Helmut Raulien <[email protected]>
Cc: Peirce List <[email protected]>
Subject: Re: [PEIRCE-L] Is Semiotics nonhumanist?

 

Dear Helmut list,

 

‘Man is a Sign.’

 

Accordingly, just as we say that a body is in motion, and not that motion is in a body we ought to say that we are in thought and not that thoughts are in us.

 

With best wishes,
Jerry R

 

On Fri, Nov 29, 2019 at 3:32 PM Helmut Raulien <[email protected]> wrote:

Hello List,

 

I am having the idea that maybe semiotics is non-humanist. But what would be humanist? Examples:

 

- Kant said, that humans do not have value, but dignity, and that you should not treat them merely as means, but always as aims too.

- In Buddhism people (and other organisms) have an innate Buddha-nature.

- In Judaeo-Christian-Islamic religions, and in Brahmanism people have an immortal soul. It is arguable however, whether religions are humanist or rather their antithesises are. Depends on interpretation, I guess, and whether one conceptualizes a benign or a wrathful God.

 

In Semiotics it is all about signs, performance. In Capitalism it is about the value in the sense of performance people give for serving the rich ("human capital"). In Semiotics it is about the value/performance for the phaneron. The interpreting system is not denied, but mostly ignored. So I donot suspect,that semiotics is antihumanist, just nonhumanist, like just not talking about the interpreters, but only about the interpretants. I guess that is ok for some time, but at some point maybe it would be ok too to take the interpreting systems, like people and other organisms into account too, and combine semiotics with systems theories? What do you think?

 

Best,

Helmut

 

 

 

 

 

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