Tag Archives: philosophy

02/7/26

Looking at Peeter Torop’s Article (2017) “Semiotics of Cultural History”  (Part 11 of 11)

1088 The final section, on cultural semiotics as semiotics of cultural history offers the trope… er… slogan… saying, “Culture is memory.”

On the fundament, the literary text2bf offers something to remember, if for no other reason than it is encoded as a text. Texts may survive to be available to the future.  Parole2af is often not so lucky.

Time is cruel

So many texts have been lost.  Precious few oral traditions remain intact.

The issue is twofold.  The text or the oral tradition needs to survive.  Also, a code for translation must be retained… or… recoverable.

This is one of the problems with the writing of ancient Mesopotamia, where there are few texts that have more than one script in a single document.

1089 Lotman spends many hours reflecting on text and code.

Some of his reflections end up in his book, Universe of the Mind.

1090 The author presents a table on Lotman and Uspenskij’s views of the temporal aspect of chronotopical analysis.

1091 Of course, the above table does not correspond to Torop’s original table2bf (fundament and derivative, Figure 1).

Perhaps, this table further develops and refines Bakhtin’s semiological structuralist model2c (Figure 2).  

However, it is hard not to imagine that the above figure translates into an interscope.

1092 Say what?

1093 The Tartu-Moscow School expresses two interscopes, the fundament culminates in the semiological structuralist model2c and the derivative rises to a yet-to-be-determined perspective-level actuality2c.

1094 Bakhtin’s notes and scribbles express two interscopes as well.  These two interscopes constitute two adjacent tiers within a model more expansive than the semiological2a structuralist2b model2c.  The construction of Torop’s article intimates that this expanse is well worth investigating.

1095 The way that Lotman’s thing includes time shows how Torop’s tables2af entangle a language2am of presence1b (as well as meaning1a).  Lotman recognizes2bm time2af as a formal requirement of the chronotope2am and forces Torop to construct his own table (Figure 4 on page 330) as a way to situate2bf that entanglement2a.

1096 Here is a juxtaposition of the virtual nested form in the category of secondness for the derivative interscope and Torop’s reconstruction of Lotman’s approach.

1097 A virtual nested form proceeds down a column in a three-level interscope.

Here are the columns in the realm of actuality2.

1098 In the general form of the derivative interscope, a perspective-level actuality2c (to be determined) brings the situation-level actuality of {cognition2bm [substantiates] social interaction2bf} into relation with the possibility of {a literary text2af [entangling] a language2am of meaning1a, presence1b and message1c}.

1099 For Torop’s table addressing Lotman (Figure 4), the perspective-level actuality2c of {semiotic arrangements2cm[substantiate] human conditions2cf} virtually brings the situation-level actuality of {Lotman’s recognition of time2bm[substantiates] Lotman’s thing with respect to time (as a three-level table)2bf} into relation with the content-level possibility that {Torop’s tables as text2af [entangle] the chronotope’s formal requirements2am of the normal context of the Tartu-Moscow School3a}.

1100 Oh yeah, that makes sense.

Cultural history manifests in the framework of the semiotics of the text, where the text is a representation of culture.

Bakhtin’s culture, that is.

Lotman’s culture, too.

1101 If Bakhtin’s insights are formalized as text by Torop’s tables, then Torop’s tables constitute a semiological structuralist model2c of Bakhtin’s insights2af and support the entanglement of a language2am that sounds very much like any language of interpretation.

What is the meaning1a, presence1b and message1c of the chronotope?

Lotman’s thing focuses on time and produces a variation of the fundament interscope.

Torop’s table of Lotman’s consideration of time produces a categorical stairway to a perspective-level actuality2c in the derivative interscope.

1102 Once again, what is Lotman’s thing?

Oh, yes, it is the archaeological recovery of an insight that is present… at least in potential… since the very origins of Slavic civilization.

In the beginning is the Word, and the Word as matter substantiates the human condition as form.

1103 Here is a picture.

Such is the resolution, of the confounding where history substantiates culture and culture entangles semiotics.

1104 My thanks to Peeter Torop, for putting pen to paper and for building the tables that demonstrate the fecundity and the surprising beauty of the first iteration of the Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics.  May a second iteration follow.

02/5/26

Looking at Kalevi Kull and Ekaterina Velmezova’s Book (2025) “Sphere of Understanding” (Part 2 of 3)

SaH 0017 The authors quest for a sphere of understanding.  They seek the egg, so to speak, impregnated by Juri Lotman’s genius.  In the interviews in chapter 2.1, Lotman is spent, although still alive.  He is old.  The interviewer is a youth, a personification of the metaphysical love-child born after Slavic civilization reveals herself to Lotman’s circumspection.

0018 The miracle of Lotman’s arrival in Estonia is, weirdly, recounted in the last interview (2.14) with psychologist and cultural theorist, Jaan Valsiner.  As it turns out, Valsiner’s step-father was instrumental in getting Juri Lotman to Estonia after the Second World War.

0019 Jaan Valsiner demonstrates that the Tartu-Moscow’s sphere of influence is diffuse.  His testimony is seconded by Paul Cobley (2.13), Terrence Deacon (2.12), Jesper Hoffmeyer (2.11) and Stuart Kauffman (2.10).

0020 The sphere becomes less diffuse in interviews with Roland Posner (2.9), Gunther Kress (2.8) and Wilfred Noth (2.7).

Notably, Noth conducts a discourse on the crucial potential of truth, as opposed to the potential of will.  Indeed, the contrast between truth and will turns out to be integral to my examination of a 2017 article on Russian identity.

0021 Finally, the sphere becomes tangible with interviews with American anthropologist, Myrdene Anderson (2.6), who researched indigenous people in Sweden, Italian semiotician Paolo Fabbri (2.5), who railed against the wooly thinking that passes for “models” in contemporary humanities, and the Italian know-it-all Umberto Eco, who noted the importance of iconicity in semiotic humanity.

What?

“Semiotic humanity”?

What about semiology?

0022 Contemporary academic discourse is currently conducted with expert-coined spoken words, but these utterancescannot picture or point to their referents.  Academics swim in a pool of differences… er… two arbitrarily related pools of differences.  No one can tell where he or she flotates.

Flotates?

This is what happens when spoken words are placeholders in two arbitrarily related systems of differences.

0023 Finally, the interviews engage a still-living member of the original Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics, Boris Uspenskij (2.2).  This interview gets a full examination in the course on Semiotics and History.  Uspenskij stands within the sphere that the authors aspire to understand.

0024 So, what does Razie Mah’s contribution under the banner of Semiotics and History offer?

0025 For the diffuse sphere, these examinations will present a historical narrative of ideas in the style of diagrams of purely relational structures.  In short, Peirce-inspired diagrams offer a new way to narrate intellectual history.

0026 For the almost tangible sphere, these examinations practice a method of association, followed by a discussion of the implications.  The articles provide material to fill in the empty slots of relational structures.  When associations are made, implications become apparent.

0027 For the sphere itself, one unexpected insight is that, as the first ascendant of the Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics struggles to fulfill the political mandate of the USSR (to make all fields of inquiry “scientific”), the researchers excavate the recently-buried remains of the civilization that is their subject of inquiry.

Imagine a scientific investigation of Russian language, history and literature, as a archaeological excavation into the being of Slavic civilization.

0028 Is that the same “she” that… um… you know… captured the attention of Juri Lotman?

How confounding.

0029 The next blog offers an introduction to Semiotics and History: The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics.

02/4/26

Semiotics and History: The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics (Part 3 of 3)

SaH 0030 This course is a fully on-line study that appears in Razie Mah’s blog.

The course should be conducted (ideally) by a mature reader along with one novice or more, (less ideally) by two novices in collaboration and (perhaps, heroically) by a novice reader working alone.

0031 The field of home-schooling is exploding (a term associated with Juri Lotman) in America, but a wary public wants to taste the products, before committing to purchase.  This online course is the first of many, I suppose, but the import for this particular exposition is obvious when considering current events.

0031 Estonia is awkwardly situated (along with the other Baltic states) between the Slavic civilization of Russia (to the east), and the Swedish, German and Polish civilizations (to the west).  Estonia was part of the USSR, during the cold war; part of the West, during the American Empire’s unipolar moment; and now is about to be nudged into a Eurasian convergence, as predicted by political theologian, Alexander Dugin.

A nudge is both a danger and an opportunity, especially for the University of Tartu, with its department of semiotics, and for the University of Moscow, with its unique constellation of intellects.

0032 One of the questions asked in almost every interview in Kull’s and Velmezova’s book goes like this, “What needs to be researched by semioticians?  Or, what topics of inquiry need exploration by newly certified semioticians?”

This course offer a number of suggestions, several in connection with a stunning post-scholastic discovery that may be attributed to the first ascent of the Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics.

Discovery?

Look and see.

The original articles are available online.

0033 Here is the list of examinations.

Go to the month in Razie Mah’s blog and scroll down.

0034 (1.) Looking at Igor Pilshchikov and Mikhail Trunin’s Article (2016) “The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics”  (December 2025, 27 blogs, points 1-376)

0035 (2.) Looking at Ekaterina Velmesova and Kalevi Kull’s Article (2017) “Boris Uspenskij…” (January 31-10, 2026, 19 blogs, points 377-641)

0036 (3.) Looking at Boris Uspenskij’s Article (2017) “Semiotics and Culture” (January 9-2, 2026, 8 blogs, points 642-743)

0037 (4.) Looking at Mihhail Lotman’s Article (2017) “History as Geography” (late February 2026, 8 blogs, points 744-840)

0038 (5.) Looking at Mikhail Trunin’s Article (2017) “Semiosphere and history” (late March 2026, 8 blogs, points 841-952)

0039 (6.) Looking at Peeter Torop’s Article (2017) “Semiotics as Cultural History” (early February 2026, 11 blogs, points 953-1104)

0040 In a little over 1000 steps, the home- or guided-schooler can find out where the Tartu-Moscow School as been (in its first ascent) and where it may be going (in its second).

02/3/26

A Course on Semiotics and History: A List of Online Contributions

SaH0001 Razie Mah offers three foundational courses that cover human evolution.

These are:

The Human Niche

(also see the four accompanying commentaries as well as the three-part Comments on Michael Tomasello’s Arc of Inquiry (1999-2019))

An Archaeology of the Fall

(also see the three part Instructor’s Guide, as well as The First Singularity and Its Fairy Tale Trace and Original Sin and Original Death: Romans 5:12-19)

How To Define the Word “Religion”

(also see the ten primers, starting with A Primer on the Category-Based Nested Form and A Primer on Sensible and Social Construction)

These courses are on sale by various electronic booksellers.

The texts are designed to be read and discussed in a seminar setting.

0002 For inquirers. educators and students would who like to try their hands at Razie Mah’s approach, Semiotics and History offers a path.  This is one course consisting of many strands.  Like a fiber in a rope, each strand strengthens the entire conceptual apparatus.  With few execptions, each course completely appears in the blog.  Some strands will have an electronic e-book component.  So, don’t be afraid to make a purchase.  You will find that the costs of Mah’s electronic works are reasonable.

In the following list, the date corresponds to the cover page of each strand.  A strand typically covers a month.

0003 The following list extends into the future, because more strands will be added over time.

Feb 6,5, 2026

Looking at Kalevi Kull and Ekaterina Velmezova’s Book (2025) “Sphere of Understanding” (Part 1 and 2 of 3)

Feb 4, 2026

Semiotics and History: The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics (Part 3 of 3)

May 30. 2026

Semiotics and History: Baroque Scholasticism

May 7, 2026

Semiotics and History: Baroque Scholasticism and Early Modernism

June 30, 2026

Semiotics and History: Early Modernism

July 31, 2026 Semiotics and History: Gnosticism in Modern America

01/31/26

Looking at Ekaterina Velmezova and Kalevi Kull’s Article (2017) “Boris Uspenskij…” (Part 1 of 19)

0377 The article before me is published by Sign System Studies (volume 45(3/4), 2017, pages 404-448) by two well-regarded semioticians.  The full title is “Boris Uspenskij on history, linguistics and semiotics”.  Kalevi Kull conducts the interviews.  Ekaterina Velmezova performs translation.

The article consists of two sit-downs.  The first takes place at the end of a eighth session of the Tartu Summer School of Semiotics, in August 25, 2011.  The topic of the Summer School was Semiotic Modelling.  The second takes place at Uspenskij’s home in Rome on May 27, 2012.  The questions are based on his book, Ego Loquens: Language and the Communicative Space (2007).

0378 This examination seeks to appreciate how one of the leading figures of the Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics, which flourished from the 1960s to the 1980s, weaves Saussure’s definition of spoken language as two arbitrarily related systems of differences, into a science-friendly inquiry into the literature of the Slavic civilization.

0379 Two arbitrarily related system of differences?

Parole (speech talk) also corresponds to the written word as well as symbolic artifacts.  Parole can be observed and measured.

Langue (the machinations that automatically decode and encode speech talk) cannot be directly observed in the same way as parole.  Yet, langue is there.  It must be.  Otherwise there is no way that someone can think before speaking, should that person choose to do so.

0380 Parole and langue are two contiguous real elements.  The continuity, if placed in brackets is [arbitrarily related].

This configuration satisfies the definition of Peirce’s category of secondness, where one real element [is contiguous with] another real element.  For Aristotle’s hylomorphe, the two real elements are matter and form.  I label the contiguity, [substance] or [substantiates], but it also could be [entangles].  Substance is typical.  Entanglement is tricky.

0381 Here is a picture of the comparison between Aristotle’s hylomorphe and Saussure’s definition of language.

0382 Saussure’s definition of language appears to be scientific, because there is no substance.  That is, there is no metaphysical reason for why what we think comes to be associated to what we say.  So, the arbitrary relation is simply a conditioned response.  A conditioned response conforms to truncated material and efficient causalities.

Another term for “conditioned response”?

How about “code” and “decode”?

0383 Okay, if that is the case, then what?

What if what we think (langue) is like matter?  What if what we say (parole) is like form?

Then, the contiguity, [arbitrary relation], seems to say that we can attach any word to any thought, without structure.  So, something structural would need to situate the content of a spoken word, even if that structure is a habit or a convention.  Once that happens, then the hylomorphe, {langue as matter [substantiates] parole as form}2a, occupies the actuality2a on the content-level of a two-level interscope.  Language2bm is the situation-level matter that induces a constellation of the content-level hylomorphe.

0384 Okay, if language2b is (by Saussure’s definition) the dyad, {langue2am [arbitrary relation] parole2af}, then how can language2b situate itself2a?

This can only happen if language2b is already participating as a situation-level category-based nested form involved in the production of statements2b.

0385 Here is a picture.

0386 It is as if the content-level actuality2a is immediately situated by a demand to substantiate a statement, as if language2b is matter and a statement2b is form.

0387 But, obviously, there is more.

The content-level actuality2a is accompanied by a normal context3a and potential1a.

So is the situation level actuality2b.

0388 For the content level, the normal context of Saussure’s semiology3a brings the dyadic actuality of {langue as matter [substantiates] parole as form}2a into relation with the potential of ‘a signified and its signifier’1a.

0389 For the situation level, the normal context of a linguistic structure (or genre or system)3b brings the dyadic actuality of {language as matter [substantiates] statements as form}2b into relation with the potential of ‘the laws of the system’1b.

01/10/26

Looking at Ekaterina Velmezova and Kalevi Kull’s Article (2017) “Boris Uspenskij…” (Part 19 of 19)

0627 Today, we no longer are who we evolved to be.

What does this imply?

We can no longer be who we evolved to be.

Our current Lebenswelt is not the Lebenswelt that we evolved in.

0628 Today, the general ego interscope presents a purely relational structure (a suite of triadic relations) that may be processed implicitly.  This is the configuration of langue, as opposed to parole.

Here is a picture.

0629 Almost all of the elements of the interscope are filled with explicit abstractions.

A trace of Aristotle’s philosophy resides in the Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics. Upwellings from deep within Slavic civilization breathe into explicit abstractions. 

An archaeology can be seen in the structure of the content- and situation-level actualities.  According to Aristotle’s hylomorphe, matter [substantiates] form.  But, this Christianized pagan civilization realizes the inverse is also a thing.  Form [entangles] matter.

0630 In the example, the form of a small bird entangles the matter of a young initiate.

The claim coheres with the crucial claim of Razie Mah’s book on hominin evolution, The Human Niche.  Our niche is the potential of triadic relations. 

The lesson appears like a banner on the perspective level.

0631 This brings me to the joke about Juri Lotman’s soulful encounter with St. Methodius.

During the first ascent of the Tartu-Moscow School in the USSR, structural3b semiological3a models2c are on the scientific side of the fence.  The fence demarks the academic turfs of science (Marxist theory) and superstition (Christian faith, in all its diversity).

Now, the second ascent of the Tartu-Moscow School occurs as the USSA, the maven of technology without meaning,claims the mantle of science (psychometric theory) as opposed to superstition (still Christian faith, in all its diversity).

0632 Does the second ascent of TMS forgo occupation of the science side of the fence?

Or does it straddle the fence?

0633 It may sound uncomfortable, but take a look at the following sequence of perspective level nested forms.

0634 In regards to the universe of signs, Lotman challenges Marx’s paradigm.

Do material arrangements [substantiate] the human condition2cf?

Lotman begs to differ.

0635 In regards to the evolution of humanity, Peircean diagrams turn out to be useful for depicting the relational beings inherent in implicit abstraction.  

Consider Comments on Michael Tomasello’s Arc of Inquiry (1999-2019), by Razie Mah, available at smashwords and other e-book venues.

0636 In regards to the human as a semiotic animal, one must not forget that both exemplar and interventional signs intercalate in the perspective level of an interscope.

The specifying, exemplar and interventional signs appear in Looking at John Deely’s Book (2010) “Semiotic Animal”.  This sequence of blogs appears in Razie Mah’s website in October 2023.

0637 What wonderful opportunities for the second ascendance of the TMS!

0638 But, that is not the only challenge that comes from this examination of the interview with Boris Uspenskij in the early 2010s and published in Sign Systems Studies in 2017.

I suppose that there is more than one way to denote primary, secondary and tertiary modeling systems, so why not advance one more?

0639 Here is another proposal.

Consider three tiers of interscopes, with the perspective-level of each tier displaying the following nested forms.

0640 To me, this sequence of primary, secondary and tertiary modeling systems suggest that Peirce’s diagrams may assist in knitting biosemiotics and TMS together into one overarching theoretical framework.

Three tiers of interscopes works well in the chapter on presence in Razie Mah’s How To Define The Word “Religion”.  So, this might be a diagram worth mulling over.

0641 I thank the interviewer, Kaveli Kull, and Boris Uspenskij for engagements worthy of examination.  I thank Ekaterina Velmezova for the translation into English. 

01/9/26

Looking at Boris Uspenskij’s Article (2017) “Semiotics and Culture”  (Part 1 of 8)

0642 The article before me is published by Sign System Studies (volume 45(3/4), 2017, pages 230-248) by Boris Uspenskij (1937-present), one of the members of the first ascent of the Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics, in the 1960s through the 1980s.  The full title is “Semiotics and culture: The perception of time as a semiotic problem”.  The paper was originally presented as a lecture held in Madrid in 2010.  Plus, the paper is based on a two-part article published under the title “History and Semiotics (the perception of time as a semiotic problem)” in 1988 and 1989.

0643 The first ascent of the Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics builds a fundament of semiology3a, structuralism3b and disciplinary languages3c that retain formal and final causations along with material and efficient causalities (called “exact methods3c“).  The result is an actuality2c, a semiological structural model2c (SVi), that stands for a dyadic actuality2a where {the literary text2af (SOi) [entangles] a language2am of meaning, presence and message1a}.

0644 Here is a diagram of the fundament interscope.

0645 Exact methods3c?

Think of it3c as flying a probe2bm into a cloud of phenomena1c that cannot fully objectify the noumenon of a literary text2bf.  This scholarly data-collector2bm extracts observations and measurements1c that will be evaluated (using exact methods) on the basis of signification3a(1a) and structure3b(1b).

0646 Semiological structural model2c?

According to the empirio-schematic judgment, a disciplinary language (relation, thirdness) brings a mechanical or mathematical model (what ought to be, secondness) into relation with observations and measurements of phenomena (what is, firstness).  

A parallel construction follows.

A disciplinary language of exact methods3c (relation, thirdness) brings a semiological structuralist model2c (what ought to be, secondness) into relation with observations and measurements of phenomena1c within a literary text2bf (what is,firstness).

0647 Phenomena1c?

Phenomena are observable and measurable facets of a noumenon, a thing itself.

According to Kant’s slogan, a phrase that Kant may have never uttered but which is attributed to him in the same way that the entire Pentateuch is attributed to Moses, a noumenon cannot be fully objectified as its phenomena.  A thing itself cannot be reduced to its observable and measurable facets.

0648 Language2bm?

Language2bm is the situation-level matter (as opposed to form) constituted by Saussure’s definition of language2aentering into a structure (or system)3b, such as a mother tongue3b, a genre3b, a style3b, an artistic community3b, a tradition3b, and other civilizational beings3b.

0649 Clearly, the semiological3a structuralist3b model2c aims to capture an Aristotelian expression of how language as matter2bm substantiates a literary text as form2bf.

Without the literary text2bf, a semiological structural model2c cannot coalesce because there is nothing to delimit free-floating, unanchored language from the phenomena that an inquirer is interested in.  It is like matter without a form to substantiate.  It’s useless.

0650 So, in the fundament interscope, language as matter2bm gives substance to the literary text as form2bf.

At the same time, the literary text as form2bf allows the entire situation-level hylomorphe2b to take a shape where language2bm may be regarded as phenomena.

0651 Say what?

Language2bm substantiates the literary form2bf and, at the same time, may be regarded as phenomena of the literary form2bf.

It2bm is substantiating matter2bm (esse_ce) because it virtually situates the content-level actuality2a, {langue2am[substantiates] parole2af}.

It2bm is regarded as literary phenomena by the perspective-level potential1c.

0652 The substantiated form2bf (essence) is like a noumenon and its2bf substantiating matter2bm (esse_ce) serves as its2bf observable and measurable facets (that is, its phenomena).

12/31/25

Looking at Igor Pilshchikov and Mikhail Trunin’s Article (2016) “The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics” (Part 1 of 27)

0001 The article before me is published by Sign System Studies (44(3) (2016) pages 368-401) by two professors, Igor Pilshchikov and Mikhail Trunin, hailing from Tallinn University in Estonia.  The title is “The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics”. The subtitle is “A transnational perspective”.

0002 The abstract promises to situate the Tartu-Moscow School of Semiotics of the 1960s through 1980s.  The article delivers more than promised.

How so?

0003 The authors sketch dynamic developments among intellectual circles within the (now former) Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

0004 The term, “transnational”, indicates that there are nations within the former Soviet Union.

During this period in history, the governments of Estonia and Russia (along with Czechoslovakia and Poland) owe fealty to an empire with the title, “Socialist”, in its name.

So, “transnational” tells me that the article looks back from the present, into a past era, with the intent of portraying ‘something’ historical, without acknowledging that the “Union” and the “Socialist” descriptors no longer apply (at least, not in the way that they once did).

0005 “Transnational” applies to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR, 1918-1989) as well as the upcoming… um… Eurasian convergence?

Here is a picture with three city-sites.  Tartu and Moscow belong to the title.  Tallinn is the location where the authors write their article.  The blue is the Baltic Sea.

0006 “Transnational” steps over the boundaries depicted in black in the above figure.

Never mind the fact that the above territories reside behind, what American pundits once called, “the Iron Curtain”.

0007 Perhaps, one must appreciate an ambiguity to the term, “transnational”, given that there is another transit.  This transit is in time.  Or, even better, this transit is across a boundary between battles among Enlightenment gods.

Consider where the time period of 1960s to 1980s resides in the following timeline of Western civilization in the twentieth century.

Also consider the year when the article under examination is published.

Notice the boundary.

0008 The Tartu-Moscow School of Semiology constellates within one battle, as a transnational collaboration.

The TMS is remembered during another battle, which is not resolved, and so cannot be objectified as “historical”.  I suppose that it can be objectified as “cultural”.  Better yet, “theodramatic”.

Already, there is more to this article than meets the eye.

06/30/25

Looking at George Mikhailovsky’s Chapter (2024) “Meanings, Their Hierarchy, and Evolution” (Part 1 of 9)

1053 The text before me is chapter six of Pathways (see point 831 for book details, pages 101 through 136).  The author is one of the editors of Pathways.

1054 To me, the abstract introduces evolution writ large.

The abstract suggests that the interventional sign-relation precedes semiotic agency, as far as evolution writ large goes.  Evolution writ large includes the evolution of the inanimate universe along with the evolution of life.

1055 Before life, inanimate objects manifest only as meanings-in-themselves.  An evolving macroscopic thing may be labeled an “eventity”, which seems like a real initiating (semiotic) event2a (SVs) or an action that could be goal-directed2c (SVi).

Surely, some eventities rely on lower-level entities.  But, what about agency and subagency?

With non-human life, hierarchies of sub-agents3 operate within each living agent3 (or “holobiont”).

With human life, persons3, who are holobionts in terms of anatomy and physiology, operate as subagents within… what?… social circles?

1056 The introduction (section 6.1) starts with an observation.  The term, “meaning” is typically used in three situations.

Here is the list along with associated sign-elements.

1057 This coincidence is remarkable.  At the very start of the introduction, the author offers situational instances of “meaning” that correlate to the three sign-objects intrinsic to a three-level interscope.

The author then writes that he is interested in the first two types (the ones associated with semiotic agency) but not so much the third type (the one associated with the interventional sign relation), because this one is already well-developed in linguistic semiotics.

1058 But, there is another coincidence to note.

Recall that Peirce’s typology of natural signs is based on the categorical qualities of the sign-object.

The icon is a sign-relation whose sign-object is based on the qualities of firstness, including images, pictures, unities, wholes.  The logic of firstness is inclusive and allows contradictions.  A sign-vehicle stands for its sign-object on the basis of similarity or imagery.

The index is a sign-relation whose sign object is based on the qualities of secondness, including contact, contiguity, pointing, influence, cause and effect and so on.  The logic of secondness includes the law of noncontradiction.  A sign-vehicle stands for its sign-object on the basis of indication and pointing.

The symbol is a sign-relation whose sign-object is based on the qualities of thirdness, including normal context, mediation, judgment, habit, tradition and so on.  The logics of thirdness are exclusion, complement and alignment.  A sign-vehicle stands for its sign-object on the basis of convention.

1059 Since all sign-objects belong to secondness, I can assign Peirce’s typologies on the basis of the category of the level in a three-level interscope.  Icon goes with the level of content.  Index associates the situation level.  Symbolmatches the perspective level.

1060 Here is a list of associations.

1061 I ask, “How well do the two coincidences correspond?

1062 I start with thirdness, an exemplar sign is a symbol whose sign-object, SOe, denotes a goal2c on the perspective level.  The sign-object has the qualities of both acquired habit and innate disposition.  So, the assignment of symbolworks.

1063 For secondness, a specifying sign is an index whose sign-object, SOs, denotes a symptom2b on the situation level. I suppose that corresponds to information2b.  A symptom2b virtually situates its phenomenon2a in the same way that information3b virtually situates an initiating (semiotic) event2a.  The sign-object holds the qualities of indication and pointing.  So, the assignment of index works.

1064 For firstness, an interventional sign is an icon whose sign object, SOi, denotes something that is indicated or expressed in spoken words or symbols2a on the content level.  Does that correspond to intention expressed2a (SOi)?  Or, better yet, does that correspond to an image of intention expressed2a (SOi) that is contiguous with a real initiating event2a (SVs) in the dyadic content-level actuality2a?

Is the third situation for “meaning” an image that is indicated or expressed in spoken words and symbols.

Imagine that!

‘Something’ is an image.

06/20/25

Looking at George Mikhailovsky’s Chapter (2024) “Meanings, Their Hierarchy, and Evolution” (Part 9 of 9)

1137 The material that I cover in my portrayal of C1 and C2 using Frege’s triangle goes with section 6.3, titled “Potential Meanings During the Abiotic Period of the Evolution of the Universe”.

Here is a picture.

C4 (is missing because it) covers the genesis of atoms with masses greater than helium.  Technically, C4 follows C5, as written above.  Why?  Atoms with masses greater than helium are produced by nuclear fusion in stars.  The story bifurcates from the cosmic sequence to the substance sequence.  The substance sequence starts with atoms with masses greater than helium and proceeds through the emergence of life.

1138 The Frege triangles for C1 and C2 are easy compared to what follows in section 6.4 (“Evolution of Meanings in Biological Systems”) and 6.5 (“The Evolution of Meanings in Human Societies and the Relationship between Hierarchies of Substance (that is, biology) and Semantics (that is, within our current Lebenswelt)”).

Nevertheless, my exercises demonstrate the utility of Frege’s triangle in the extension of the biosemiotic interscope into all aspects of postmodern inquiry, including into abiotic noumena, the domains of physics and chemistry.

1139 There are many threads to follow in this demonstration.

The first thread is obvious.  Can this be done for all noumena listed in Table 6.2?

The answer is yes.  Once one starts a spiral, other spirals follow, and they diverge, and they coalesce, and who knows what else.

1140 The starting point of the author’s cosmos chain (C1) is obviously the Big Bang.

But, one can say that other starting points can be imagined, hence theories of the multiverse.  The multiverse consists of many universes, each with different energy, space, natural laws and constants.  Physicists can simulate these many “universes”.  Hollywood movie makers can fashion plotlines from the conceptc.  It is all very theatrical, including the name for the start of our own universe, “the first singularity”.

1141 The starting point of the author’s substantial chain (S1) is atoms, made in stellar furnaces because (up to the atomic configuration of iron) fusing atoms releases a tremendous amount of energy, enough to keep a star from falling in on itself from gravity.

Anyone who has cracked a chemistry textbook knows that there is no “first singularity” to be found in this discipline.  One can imagine that each element in the periodic table constitutes its own singularity.  Spirals diverge and coalesce in the most fantastic ways, so there is no telling which molecules are the precursors to life and which are not.

1142 This is where Frege’s terms complement Peirce’s.

Frege’s terms serve as spoken labels.  Labels are used for symbolic operations.  Symbolic operations undergird grammar (that is, language).  So, Frege’s terms point to the somewhat disturbing intimation that speech-alone talk (or a theoretical equivalent) is intercalated into semiotic agency and, by way of bridging, to significance that is outside of semiotic agency (that is, the interventional sign-relation).

Here is a picture.

1143 Peirce’s terms also serve as spoken labels.  These labels apply to the contiguities between real elements in the actualities of all interscopes.  These labels apply to something like [substance], in a contiguity between something like matter and something like form.  To a greater or lesser extent, all dyads in Peirce’s secondness pay tribute to Aristotle’s hylomorphe as an exemplar.

1144 The biosemiotic interscope reifies into the biosemiotic noumenal overlay, including both semiotic agency and the interventional sign-relation.

This chapter presents an impossible challenge.  Spirals (or hierarchies) go back to the first singularity, thirteen billion years ago.  Each spiral brings the inquirer to a new level.  Some spirals write small, others write large, but they all begin … for us … with a clot.  A pen touches paper, then moves to portray a diagram, a purely relational structure, portraying what all living things have in common.

1145 This examination recites all that has gone before.

This examination is a refutation to those who think that modern science knows enough to weave these spirals into a vision of our universe, as well as of us, the images of the one who speaks the universe into being.

1146 I say, “Diagram spirals!”

Perhaps, the author agrees and anticipates that Frege’s triangles will reveal a hierarchy… or is it?… a spirality that portrays meanings and their evolution.