Today I have had an article writing day devoted to revising my article on climate ethics and CCS, with some 200 words written. I also did some thinking and sketching related to our Semiotic agency book, specifically on the ontological nature of agents.
Today I have had an article writing day devoted to revising and commenting on chapter 7, "Semiosis", for our book Semiotic agency, with some 400 words written. Total number of writing days this Spring is up to 15.
Yesterday I attended the second day of our faculty leadership group gathering at Hotell Jæren, Bryne. I also attended, and chaired, the first, constitutive meeting of the steering group for Cognitive Lab (Cognitive and behavioral neuroscience lab), and was elected chair of the steering group. And I had one more meeting.
Yesterday I had a ph.d. supervision session, attended the CubaNor steering group meeting, and attended the first day of the faculty leadership group´s gathering at Hotell Jæren, Bryne.
Today I have attended 4 meetings. This included my second department leadership group meeting - this time held physically - and the start-up meeting for a new project at the department, ISPAS.
Today I have taken part in 3 meetings, including my weekly meeting with the office manager and the work group meeting on a master in psychology.
I also presented Cognitive lab, along with Kolbjørn Brønnick, at the rector´s meeting, with some 20 people in leadership positions attending.
And, I also served as external examiner at an oral exam at Centre for development and the environment (SUM) at University of Oslo at a Master thesis defense.
Today I have had an article writing day devoted to contributing to chapter 12 of our book Semiotic agency, "Agentology: Crosspollination of Science and Philosophy", with some 1.200 words written.
Total number of writing days so far this Spring is up to 14.
I have been appointed to the honorable committee of the XIX Congreso Internacional de la Asociación Espanola de Semiótica (AES), in my capacity as President of the Nordic association for Semiotic Studies. The conference takes place April 21-23, 2022 at University of Granada.
Today I have attended a grading meeting with an examiner at University of Oslo, and three job interviews in relation to a ph.d. position at Department of cultural studies and languages (UIS).
Today I have attended the meeting of Norway´s Council for animal ethics, and a job interview for a ph.d. position (as tentative co-supervisor).
Today I have had three meetings. This included the weekly faculty leadership group meeting, and a weekly covid-related meeting.
I have just composed the blurb below for my invited presentation at a workshop to be held in May.
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Individuality and subjectivity in animals in light of Umwelt temporality
In a biosemiotic understanding, all animals are endowed with an Umwelt as described by the German-Baltic biologist Jakob von Uexküll (1864–1944) in his classical Umwelt theory, which was developed in the period 1909–1940. In my work I have focused on developing perspectives on Umwelt temporality, starting with a notion of “Umwelt transition” (i.e., environmental change as seen from an Umwelt perspective). While some Umwelt transitions are regular (e.g. developmental), others represent historical events. Another central term in my work is “Umwelt trajectory”, representing the path through time taken by a living being as described by way of its changing relations to significant others. These notions may be applied in historical studies as well as futures studies. This provides us with a theoretical framework and methodology for studying animals as agents endowed with individual semiotic agency.
Nordic Master Programme in Social Work and Welfare (NOSWEL) at University of Stavanger (in collaboration with Aalborg University, Denmark) is open for applications with deadline March 1st. Successful applicants will start studying in August 2021.
Today I have finished revising chapter 9, Phenomenology, for our book Semiotic agency, with some 700 words written today. Total number of writing days so far this Spring is up to 13.
Today I have had an article writing day devoted to revising chapter 9, "Phenomenology", for our book Semiotic agency, with some 300 words written. I also made a figure depicting how a biosemiotic understanding differs from a simplistic phenomenological understanding of the phenomenal complexity experienced by different organisms.
I have been notified that my book chapter "Neurosemiotics across species" has been accepted for publication in a Routledge Handbook on neurosemiotics, edited by Adolfo García and Agustin Ibanez.
I have just submitted the abstract "Human development, inequality and social risks in Latin-America and the Nordic countries" for the 2021, virtual conference of the International society for quality-of-live studies (ISQOLS 2021).
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Human development, inequality and social risks in Latin-America and the Nordic countries
This presentation is based on a published article, Tønnessen (2019), which provides an overview and analysis of human development, inequality and people´s perception of social and economic risks in Latin America and the Nordic countries. While Nordic countries rank very highly on the UN´s Human Development Index (HDI) and are known for their ‘Nordic welfare model’, Latin American countries have been making significant progress economically, and with regard to health and education. However, inequality levels remain high throughout Latin America, representing an obstacle to further human development in the region. This is evidenced by the UN´s inequality-adjusted HDI data, among other sources. High levels of inequality translate to a poorer-than-average social welfare for significant portions of the populations in Latin American countries. To a large extent, actual living conditions are reflected in what people perceive as social risks when looking ahead and thinking about their own prospects, as well as those of their families. Improved and more equal living conditions are therefore likely to change people´s life satisfaction, in addition to what they are the most concerned about. In this article, people´s perception of social risks in selected Latin American and Nordic countries is analysed based on data from the OECD´s Cross-National Survey on Social and Economic Risks.
Reference
Tønnessen, Morten 2019. Human development, inequality and social risks in Latin America and the Nordic countries. Journal of Comparative Social Work 14(1). 28 pp. DOI: https://doi.org/10.31265/jcsw.v14i1.231
Today I have attended 2 meetings. One of these concerned the collaboration between our research school at the department, SWEL, and PROFRES, a national research school.
Today I have attended the second day of the 3-day HMS training I am subjected to.
Today I have had 3 meetings. This included my weekly meeting with the office manager, and a meeting concerning plans for establishing a regular welfare conference in Stavanger.
Today I have had an article writing day devoted to revising my chapter "Neurosemiotics across species" for a second time, with some 300 words written net.
Number of article days so far this Spring is 11.
Today I have had an article writing day devoted mostly to some revision of chapter 2 in our book Semiotic agency, "Historical Overview of Developments of the Notions of Agency", with some 300 words written net.
Number of writing days in 2021 to date is up to 10.
I have made one more registration in CRISTIN for 2020, bringing my 2020 total up to 21 posts (cf. my CRISTIN profile).
According to Google Scholar I now have 487 citations. This is 30 less than as of December 30th, for some reason. 2020 now stands at 61 citations (-4 since December 30th), and 2021 at 2 citations (+2). My h-index is now 12 (-1) and my h10-index 16 (-4).
My conference abstract for the 20th gathering in biosemiotics is included in a book publication:
Tønnessen, Morten 2020c. Introducing a three-dimensional interactive semiotic model of environmental change. Pp. 308–310 in Ľudmila Lacková, Claudio J. Rodríguez H. & Kalevi Kull (eds.), Gatherings in Biosemiotics XX (Tartu Semiotics Library 20). Tartu: Tartu University Press.
The book is available for download here.
Today I have attended 4 scheduled meetings, and had a hospital appointment. The meetings included the steering group meeting of Network for welfare research.
Today I have chaired 5 trial lectures and job interviews, related to a call for associate professors in psychology to be recruited by our department.
Altogether this week I have had 10 scheduled meetings, conducted 5 job interviews and had 1 day of HMS training.
Today I have attended 5 meetings. This included the first monthly meeting with the dean, two budget meetings, and the weekly fakulty leadership group meeting.
