And yet I feel that something fundamental is being concealed by deploying the term in this way. — Wayfarer
And the idea of 'pure information' seems nonsensical to me, as it has to exist in relationship to an agent or interpretive act. — Wayfarer
That is a different matter. I don't know if the optic nerve 'carries information' - in that context, I'd agree that the use of the term 'information' is metaphorical. It's not 'information' until a subject interprets it. What is transmitted are electro-chemical reactions across cellular pathways. — Wayfarer
Why is it a different matter? If the neural impulses are not information until interpreted, why isn't it the same for DNA?
And where is the interpreting subject in each of these cases? Interpretation is something carried out by minds. Instructions, information and interpretation are metaphors when we are talking about DNA. The genetic process is carried out mindlessly. — Daemon
And where is the interpreting subject in each of these cases? Interpretation is something carried out by minds. — Daemon
Long reach is a broad dump fluor acid? I love to walk along with you III, but I'm not sure I can follow... — EugeneW
Language is a bathtub full of acid — lll
'the Logos'... reappears in the writings of the Stoics, and it is especially by them that this theory is developed. God, according to them, "did not make the world as an artisan does his work, but it is by wholly penetrating all matter that He is the demiurge of the universe" (Galen, "De qual. incorp." in "Fr. Stoic.", ed. von Arnim, II, 6); He penetrates the world "as honey does the honeycomb" (Tertullian, "Adv. Hermogenem", 44), this God so intimately mingled with the world is fire or ignited air; inasmuch as He is the principle controlling the universe, He is called Logos; and inasmuch as He is the germ from which all else develops, He is called the seminal Logos (logos spermatikos). This Logos is at the same time a force and a law, an irresistible force which bears along the entire world and all creatures to a common end, an inevitable and holy law from which nothing can withdraw itself, and which every reasonable man should follow willingly (Cleanthus, "Hymn to Zeus" in "Fr. Stoic." I, 527-cf. 537). — New Advent Encyclopedia
In the biosemiotic view cellular processes can be understood in semiotic terms, rather than in terms of chemical interactions, because (I suppose) life is more language-like than machine-like. It represents a paradigm shift from mechanistic models of life. — Wayfarer
A lot of the time, that seems to be where you're writing from. — Wayfarer
"the way in which language constantly overflows itself, so that any established pattern of usage is immediately built on, developed, and transformed. The very act of using linguistic expressions or applying concepts transforms the content of those expressions or concepts. The way in which discursive norms incorporate and are transformed by novel contingencies arising from their usage is not itself a contingent, but a necessary feature of the practices in which they are implicit.. — Brandom
The idea that the most basic linguistic know–how is not mastery of proprieties of use that can be expressed once and for all in a fixed set of rules, but the capacity to stay afloat and find and make one’s way on the surface of the raging white–water river of discursive communal practice that we always find ourselves having been thrown into (Wittgensteinian Geworfenheit) is itself a pragmatist insight... that owes more to Hegel than it does to Kant....The process of applying conceptual norms in judgment and intentional action is the very same process that institutes, determines, and transforms those conceptual norms. — Brandom
Hegel’s universal spirit is sometimes used as an example of “ontological holism”—i.e., the claim that social entities are fundamental, independent, or autonomous entities, as opposed to being derived from individuals or non-social entities (Taylor 1975, Rosen 1984).
That is being very simplistic. But it emphasises that the interpretation of a sign isn’t really about some kind of attentional mental effort. It is about meaningful habits of reaction. It is about learnt patterns of rational response - rational meaning it could be written out as an if/then kind of program in the extreme case. A set of switches organise to do useful work in the world. — apokrisis
I think language is crucial as (1) the medium of philosophy itself and (2) an apparent site of collision of 'mind' and 'matter.' But 'mind' and 'matter' are themselves tokens in this 'raging white-water,' so philosophical language is a fairy trying to catch its own tale. — lll
As I understand it, the principle of biosemiosis broadens the notion of 'intepretation' to include the way in which living cells inter-operate. — Wayfarer
But 'mind' and 'matter' are themselves tokens in this 'raging white-water,' so philosophical language is a fairy trying to catch its own tale. — lll
It treats cells as if they were persons, with minds — Daemon
I still see the basic distinction between inorganic matter, living things, and rational beings that goes back to Aristotle. — Wayfarer
For the most part, you and Daemon use the word "information" in its colloquial sense, where I would use the phrase "semantic information". — Galuchat
Information isn't everywhere in the universe, it's in minds. It isn't in the tree stump. Your own example partly acknowledges that, in the way you have the observer come along and look at the tree rings. The information is in the mind of the observer. In the tree, there are only the rings.
If you think the information is doing something in the tree, tell us what it is. — Daemon
So maybe you can summarize or quote the part of the article that information and meaning are not the same thing because the way people use the terms indicates that they are the same thing. In saying that tree rings mean the age of the tree, we are saying that the tree rings carry information about the age of the tree. And when we ask what something means, we are asking about the causes of the effects that we observe. In asking what someone means by their use of words, we are asking what their idea is that they are trying to communicate (the cause of the words appearing on the screen).Warren Weaver: The word information, in this theory, is used in a special sense that must not be confused with its ordinary usage. In particular, information must not be confused with meaning. https://www.panarchy.org/weaver/communication.html — Daemon
This results in a misguided anthropomorphism. So when chemicals pass between trees through the fungal network, it's reported that the trees are talking to one another, conveying information. — Daemon
Information is communicated between persons, not objects. — Daemon
Don't know about that. I still see the basic distinction between inorganic matter, living things, and rational beings that goes back to Aristotle. — Wayfarer
Switches are mechanical, but signs are semantic. I can see how signs can drive switches, but I can't see how switches can produce signs. — Wayfarer
Which pre-human was rational? Or was it exactly homo sapiens who crossed that line ? — lll
Wouldn't viruses be non-living things that store genetic history? (Supposing they don't fall under the definition of living things). — Count Timothy von Icarus
If so, attention could then more fruitfully turn to the semiotic view of information that bridges that "insuperable gap". As has already been covered in this thread. :grin: — apokrisis
According to the "phaneoroscopy" or "phenomenology" of Peirce, manifestation itself does not reveal a presence, it makes a sign. One may read in the Principle of Phenomenology that "the idea of manifestation is the idea of a sign."There is thus no phenomenality reducing the sign or the representer so that the thing signified may be allowed to glow finally in the luminosity of its presence. The so-called "thing itself" is always already a representamen shielded from the simplicity of intuitive evidence. The representamen functions only by giving rise to an interpretant that itself becomes a sign and so on to infinity. The self-identity of the signified conceals itself unceasingly and is always on the move. The property of the representamen is to be itself and another, to be produced as a structure of reference, to be separated from itself.“ — Joshs
Lambert proposed in fact to "reduce the theory of things to the theory of signs." — Joshs
According to the "phaneoroscopy" or "phenomenology" of Peirce, manifestation itself does not reveal a presence, it makes a sign. One may read in the Principle of Phenomenology that "the idea of manifestation is the idea of a sign."There is thus no phenomenality reducing the sign or the representer so that the thing signified may be allowed to glow finally in the luminosity of its presence. The so-called "thing itself" is always already a representamen shielded from the simplicity of intuitive evidence. The representamen functions only by giving rise to an interpretant that itself becomes a sign and so on to infinity. The self-identity of the signified conceals itself unceasingly and is always on the move. The property of the representamen is to be itself and another, to be produced as a structure of reference, to be separated from itself.“ — Joshs
Get involved in philosophical discussions about knowledge, truth, language, consciousness, science, politics, religion, logic and mathematics, art, history, and lots more. No ads, no clutter, and very little agreement — just fascinating conversations.