ࡱ> EGD @ A bjbj)) 44KzKzA:::::::NVVVV,N:5777777$RV[:[::p ::55:: TNؖVx<0H o^H NN::::bH :9-[[NNR  NNR Biosemiotics and the shift from reduction to emergence. John Pickering. Psychology Department TV University Notes for a talk given on May 15th., 2007. Part 1. What shift? The shift to emergence has been taking shape for over a century. In their different ways, Bergson, Whitehead, Peirce and Dewey shared a common concern: to move our worldview beyond reduction and Platonic essentialism. The central issue here is meaning, both in the sense of perception: what the world does to organisms and in the sense of action: what organisms do to the world. The shift is visible in many areas of science, including physics, biology and psychology. In biology it is represented in the move from genetic essentialism towards a more systems view of what genes actually are, in which evolution and development are treated together. In psychology the shift is clear in recent moves to reclaim cognition from a restrictive mechanistic metaphor and to replace it in a context of embodied action in which meaning and intentionality are central, primordial facts of mental life. Postmodernism provides the tools to understand this shift in all its manifestations. Part 2. What is Biosemiotics? Traditions of semiotics in Europe, deriving from Saussure, have concentrated on cultural signs, especially language. The focus has been on what a sign might be and on the essential arbitrary relationship between a sign and that which it denotes. American traditions, deriving from C. S. Peirce are broader. They deal with signification as the basis of a flow of embodied action. This action is genuinely open and creative, which is what makes biosemiotics the natural vocabulary in which to discuss the relation of intentionality Contemporary biologists, psychologists and cultural theorists are using Peirce's view of the sign as the basis for a contextualised treatment of mental life. Hoffmeyer and others are using semiotics as the theoretical language in which to discuss the role of Meaning in evolution and culture. Part 3. So what? The shift to emergence has the potential to change what psychologists take as the primary phenomena to be explained. Hence, it opens the way to bringing new resources into what we teach, into how we do research and into what we take as data. The later work of Merleau-Ponty is offered as illustration of what is mean here. It points towards a process view of nature and towards a synthesis of Continental and Analytic traditions. Details of a conference (June 2007) on Biosemiotics:  HYPERLINK "http://www.biosemiotics.org/Gatherings2007/" http://www.biosemiotics.org/Gatherings2007/ Slides, notes:  HYPERLINK "http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/psych/people/academic/jpickering/johnpickering/" http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/psych/people/academic/jpickering/johnpickering/ Sources. Anderson, W. (1996) The Fontana postmodernism reader. London : Fontana. Originally published in America as:  HYPERLINK "http://www.waltanderson.info/work5.htm" The Truth about the Truth: De-confusing and Re-constructing the Postmodern World. The American edition is better - chapters were taken out for the UK edition. Barbieri, M. (Ed.) (2007) Introduction to Biosemiotics. Dordrecht: Springer. An up to date collection of writings covering the history of the subject and its contemporary application in physics, biology and psychology. Evolution, development and epigenetics are major themes. Gergen, K. (2001) Psychological science in a postmodern context. American Psychologist. 56(10): 803-813. Gergen's claim is that psychology has become conceptualy and methodologically 'frozen' and the Postmodernism provides the means to thaw it out. Gregersen, N. (Ed.) (2003) From Complexity to Life: On the Emergence of Life and Meaning. New York: Oxford University Press. A revolution is in process about what kind of universe this is. The scientists represented here, Paul Davies, Stuart Kauffman, Ian Stewart and many others, find a natural systems tend to increase in complexity and hence in the capacity for sentience. Hoffmeyer, J. (1996) Signs of Meaning in the Universe. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Originally published in Danish in 1993. Jencks, C. (1992) The Postmodern Reader. London: Academy Editions. Typically joke-strewn treatment of a range of postmodern sources. Laughlin, R. (2005) A Different Universe. New York: Basic Books. A Nobel Laureate in Physics announces a shift in the scientific worldview, from Reductionism to Emergence. The search for ultimate causes shifts from the behaviour of parts to the behaviour of collectives. (An endorsement by another physics laureate, Philip Anderson, can be found in Nature 434/701, 2005.) Merleau-Ponty, M. (1995) La Nature: Notes Cours du Collge de France, 1956-1957. Published in English as Nature, trans. Robert Vallier, Evanston: Northwestern Univ. Press, 2003. One of a number of posthumous publications: contains Merleau-Ponty's response to Whiteheads Science and the Modern World and The Concept of Nature. Peirce, C. (1991) Peirce on Signs. Edited by James Hoopes, London: University of North Carolina Press. A collection of Peirce's major papers on signification. Notable quote from Hoopes' introduction: "Thinking, in Peirce's view is not something that must somejow be related to behaviour. Thinking is behaviour'. Von Uexkll, J. (1982b) The Theory of Meaning. Semiotica, 42. pp 25 - 82. Von Uexkll, T. (1982a) Jacob von Uexkll's Theory of Meaning. Semiotica, 42. pp 1 - 24. Taken together, these articles by Jacob (father) and Thure (grandson) present the foundations and development of von Uexkll's ideas, especially his semiotic view of perception, the Umwelt. Wheeler, W. (2006) The Whole Creature: Complexity, Biosemiotics and the Evolution of Culture. London: Lawrence and Wishart. Wheeler shows how biological and cultural evolution are inter-dependent. (Reviewed by John Pickering in Journal of Consciousness Studies, 14/2, 2007.) Whitehead, A. (1929) Science and the Modern World. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Whitehead, A. (1938) Modes of Thought. 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