At long last I have received the proceedings of the 9th congress of the IASS/AIS - Helsinki-Imatra, 11-17 June, 2007, "Communication: Understanding/Misunderstanding", edited by Eero Tarasti (associated editors: Paul Forsell and Richard Littlefield). And quite a work it is, in 3 volumes (Acta Semiotica Fennica XXXIV, International Semiotics Institute, Imatra/Semiotic Society of Finland, Helsinki 2009).
My text "Where I end and you begin: The threshold of the self and the intrinsic value of the phenomenal world" appears pp. 1798-1803 (vol. III). Here, for the first time in Earth history (in print), I offer "a critique of a critique", namely of semioethics: "While I agree with several of the foundational statements of a semioethics proper, i have some critical remarks as to its present manifestation." I have now been engaged with semioethics for 2 years plus, not least through this spring's first "semioethics interviews" with John Deely, the first of which will sooner-than-ever be published. The article also contains seeds to what I now call "semiotic economy".
In the article I refer to:
David Agler
Gregory Bateson
Donald Favareau
Arne Næss
Susan Petrilli and Augusto Ponzio
David Rothenberg
and myself ("Umwelt ethics")
The name of my article appears in the Contents (vol. I, p. xx). I ("Tonnesen") is further referred to in the Thematic index (vol. III) under the keywords "biosemiotics" (p. 1971) - but not under "ethics", nor "politics", nor "semioethics".
My text "Where I end and you begin: The threshold of the self and the intrinsic value of the phenomenal world" appears pp. 1798-1803 (vol. III). Here, for the first time in Earth history (in print), I offer "a critique of a critique", namely of semioethics: "While I agree with several of the foundational statements of a semioethics proper, i have some critical remarks as to its present manifestation." I have now been engaged with semioethics for 2 years plus, not least through this spring's first "semioethics interviews" with John Deely, the first of which will sooner-than-ever be published. The article also contains seeds to what I now call "semiotic economy".
In the article I refer to:David Agler
Gregory Bateson
Donald Favareau
Arne Næss
Susan Petrilli and Augusto Ponzio
David Rothenberg
and myself ("Umwelt ethics")
The name of my article appears in the Contents (vol. I, p. xx). I ("Tonnesen") is further referred to in the Thematic index (vol. III) under the keywords "biosemiotics" (p. 1971) - but not under "ethics", nor "politics", nor "semioethics".
4 comments:
I enjoyed your reference to what you say you "now" call "semiotic economy". I'm researching, amateurishly, onto that. Wonder if you find Grice PERE of interest. I wrote about it extensively in my griceclub.blogspot. It stands for "principle of economy of rational effort" -- but I assume your thing is more along Morin's idea of a semiotic system as being the most efficient _under the circumstances_ -- but what about redundancy and noise? I have a couple of commenters in my blog that seem to be onto the 'economy' thing, and, since a google led me to your interesting blog, I'd thought I drop a comment. Cheers.
Cheers yourself. I am embarrassingly unfamiliar with Grice's Principle of Economy of Rational Effort. Could you please explain its relevance? Or refer me to a particular post of yours? Morin has escaped me as well, I am afraid. What I am interested in, at any rate, is the economy considered as a sign system enveloping not only human players, but non-human "stakeholders" as well. Phenomenology comes to mind - but not in any narrow sense. Within this perspective, an important task is to distinguish between different possible or actual "sign systems" of economy. I do not think there's any inevitability in the way our economy has turned out. There's other realities, futures, forms of semiosis possible.
Hey! "Cheers yourself!" sounds pretty offensive. NOT TO ME! I loved it! I think, literally and etymologicall, it meant, "bring some chairs". They Brits abuse the term so often, to mean a lot of idiocies, so I took it up!
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Toennesen writes:
"I am embarrassingly unfamiliar with Grice's Principle of Economy of Rational Effort."
Don't say that! Never complain, never apologise! It's because I lead this Grice Club I care! The thing is pretty simplistic and should be online.
"Could you please explain its relevance? Or refer me to a particular post of yours?"
I THINK -- since we both share blogger, that there is an engine search in griceclub.blogspot where if you type, "principle of economy of rational effort" you may get one or two hits. It means simply what it says, that EFFORT (never mind rational) is economised. Since you speak of 'semiotic economy' I thouhgt it connected, and I know it does! He was, after all, a semiotician (of sorts -- and a philosopher -- like me -- what is your background if I may ask?)
"Morin has escaped me as well, I am afraid."
Well, as an undergraduate and preparing for my philosophy-of-language courses, and while in Paris I got hold of some work on semiotics, and Edgar Morin had these analyses of things like the EFFICIENT economy of the alphabet say, in graphia. The fact that with a VERY FEW sememes: the stroke, the horizontal stroke, the semicircle, etc. we get 24 signs which are mutually differentiated like that is the epitomy of semiotic economy, as I see it.
"What I am interested in, at any rate, is the economy considered as a sign-system enveloping not only human players, but non-human "stakeholders" as well."
I see: the 'oikos' as The House, I assume.
"Phenomenology comes to mind - but not in any narrow sense. Within this perspective, an important task is to distinguish between different possible or actual "sign systems" of economy. I do not think there's any inevitability in the way our economy has turned out. There's other realities, futures, forms of semiosis possible."
I see. As a classicist, I am fascinated how economics as a discipline even got started. I think Aristotle had a pretty narrow description of the "house". I once met a man in a disco. I said -- actually I think he was from Scandinavia --, "Where are you from?". "What do you mean?". "Where is your home?". He was drunk, and I wasn't in one of my days. "I don't have a home". We were overhearing "Gypsy Woman" by Crystal Waters in the background -- this was Buenos Aires. "Oh, so you are homeless" -- he almost strikes me! (Whereas I left him and got onto the dance floor where the music went, "but she is homeless, she is homeless, and she stays there, singing for money, ta ra ree ta ra ra ra ta ra ree ta ra ra ra -". Great song! And thanks for your thoughts! Elaborate!
Bring your own chairs, indeed (if you need one, that is - for me, the ground as such has sitting-quality).
"Will and Grice"! See, THERE I get what you're talking about!
I like your vote on the truth-value gap.
And I quote:
"He was, after all, a semiotician (of sorts -- and a philosopher -- like me -- what is your background if I may ask?)"
I am a philosopher (master, Norway) and semiotician (Ph.D.-student/researcher, Estonia - still making use of lots of philosophy).
Philosophy of language has puzzled me all along. In Oslo, I never got a grip on it. In Tartu, I didn't either, the way it is being taught herearound. But when I write about it myself, it is one of the topics of philosophy that engages me the most.
I like constructing new concepts, so I don't have to follow other people's definitions.
I like to define.
This creative power.
Philosophy would not be worthwhile without it.
Not sure I'm a good reader, but I'm a pretty good definer.
Would be nice to have my own language one day.
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