Abstract: "Introducing semiotic economy"

Introducing semiotic economy

Morten Tønnessen

Abstract submitted for the special theme session Consumption as Signification (chaired by Kristian Bankov), part of The 31st Annual Meeting of the Semiotic Society of Finland, June 9–10

Associate professor at Department of Health Studies, University of Stavanger

Researcher in the grant Dynamical Zoosemiotics and Animal Representations (Department of Semiotics, University of Tartu)

The ten steps to a semiotics of being detailed in Tønnessen 2010 (and said to be “pertinent to various sub-fields at the conjunction of semiotics of nature […] and semiotics of culture […]”) conclude with the following four points:

7) An imperative task in our contemporary world of faltering biological diversity is that of Umwelt mapping, i.e. a mapping of ontological niches.

8) The ecological crisis is an ontological crisis with historical roots in humankind’s domestication of animals and plants, which can be taken as archetypical for our attempted planet-scale taming of the wild.

9) The process of globalization is expressed by correlated trends ofdepletion of semiotic diversity and semiotic diversification.

10) Semiotic economy is a field which task it is to map the human ontological niche insofar as its semiotic relations are of an economic nature.

The ontological niche of point 7 was first introduced in Tønnessen 2003: 288 as “the set of contrapuntal relations that [a being] takes part in at a given point of natural history”. The notion is one of several profitable specifications of Uexküll’s Umwelt concept. In plain language, the ontological niche represents what a being does in fact do (relate to), rather than the interpretative challenges it encounters in its semiotic niche (Hoffmeyer). Semiotic economy, then, traces the actual behavior of the human species in Umwelt (i.e., ecological) terms, via a mapping of the impact that human behavior has directly and indirectly as manifested in the Umwelten of humans and notably of other living beings. This prospective field of study – involving a more qualitative approach to economics (and a more phenomenological approach, in a wide, Uexküllian sense) – is thus fitted for empirical studies. From this theoretical vantage point, (human) consumption can be conceived of in terms of signification not only from a human point of view but also from an animal point of view.

References

Tønnessen, Morten 2003. Umwelt ethics. Sign Systems Studies, 31.1: 281-299.

— 2010. Steps to a semiotics of being. Biosemiotics 3.3: 375-392.

Reference: Rethinking language

I have been made aware of a citation of my work, in a text by Stephen Cowley, or more precisely:

Cowley, Stephen J. and Zheng, Dongping 2011. '"The turning of the tide: Rethinking language, mind and world'". Review of Per Linell: Rethinking language, mind, and world dialogically: Interactional and contextual theories of human sense-making. Journal of Multicultural Discourses 2011 (1?): 1-14. First published online 18 March 2011 (DOI: 10.1080/17447143.2011.554642).

The paragraph in which I am cited, on page 10, reads as follows (note that 'Tønneson' should be spelled 'Tønnessen'):

Linell regards dynamics as ‘‘an ontology for the living’’. These ground dialogue in the pre-conceptual, the pre-conscious, and the pre-verbal (254). Indeed, Linell views the sub-personal as dialogical. Not only is there neural evidence for this (Damasio 1994), but it is consistent with turning from ‘‘meaning’’ to sense-making. Breaking with Schu¨ tz (1962), Linell denies that entities identified in transcriptions are basic (or first-order). Rather, order emerges from the dynamics of the voice, face, and body that prompt us to perceive as we do: we rely on embodied variability. Indeed, direct sense-making makes conversation the basis for learning about mediated activities as perception-action systems prompt judgments. When made explicit, conversations link them to sociocultural norms: these extend the ecology by allowing silent-thirds to shape human skills. Interworlds are independent of the processes and products of talk: they arise from unmediated responsivity in, for example, Tønneson’s (2009) ‘‘ontological niche’’ that allows a pack of wolves to orient similarly to a changing environment. Similarly, Stuart (2010) traces sense making to enkinaesthesia, an affectively driven, fluctuating sense of the other (and the enkinaesthetic response of the other). While, Linell uses the verbal to evoke reality, his hermeneutics link with both Bakhtin’s responsive understanding and a mild realism. By tracing dialogue to an extended ecology, languaging can connect both the living and the non-living. Here we go beyond Linell by tracing even monological projects (e.g. science) to dynamical roots. While controversial, this echoes the logic of Rethinking. It is our hope that, in voicing another perspective, we open up new conversation.

"Mapping human impact" published in vol. 1 of "Approaches to cultural theory"

My book chapter "Mapping Human Impact – Expanding Horizons: Interdisciplinary Integration" features as chapter 5, pp. 93-106 in the now published The Space of Culture - the Place of Nature In Estonia and Beyond. This book is the very first volume in Tartu University Press' new book series Approaches to Cultural Theory.

Reference:

Tønnessen, Morten 2011. Mapping human impact - expanding horizons: Interdisciplinary integration. Pp. 93-106 in Tiina Peil (ed.): The Space of Culture - the Place of Nature In Estonia and Beyond (= Approaches to Cultural Theory vol. 1). Tartu: Tartu University Press.

My contribution has been placed in the book's second section, "Constructing Nature", along with contributions from Maaris Raudsepp and Kirsi Laurén. Other contributors to the volume include Roland Posner ("Eight historical paradigms of the human sciences"), Kalevi Kull ("Foundations for ecosemiotic deep ecology") and Mats Widgren ("A world of domesticated landscapes"), among others.

Reference: On the ontological niche, semiotic niche, and the ethiosphere

I have recently found out that I am referred to in Susan Stuart's book chapter "Enkinaesthesia, Biosemiotics, and the Ethiosphere" (pp. 305-330 in Stephen Cowley, João Carlos Major, Sune Steffensen and Alfredo Dini (eds.): Signifying Bodies: Biosemiosis, Interaction and Health. Portuguese Catholic University, Braga, Portugal.). The reference appears on page 325, just ahead of the Conclusion:

One brief last word is important to respond to a possible objection and emphasise the range over which the ethiosphere can be said to extend. Tønnessen [2009] distinguishes between the semiotic niche or semiosphere, and an ontological niche. The semiotic niche, he argues, operates within the class of ideal agents, and the ontological niche describes real agential relations. So, the ontological niche concerns living organisms. If we accept his distinction, then the ethiosphere would seem most naturally to apply in real world circumstances where the relations are felt concernful matterings and not over the semiosohere; however, from an enactivist ethical consideration of real, multi-directional, contrapuntal relations [Colombetti & Torrance 2009], it would be possible to conceive of, and even formulate, a normativity that ought to hold in ideal circumstances and, thus, across the semiosphere. So, although at first glance the notion of the ethiosphere seems more clearly co-extensive with the non-ideal ontological niche, there is no confounding reason to think it not, at least, potentially coextensive with the semiosphere as well.

Reference:

Tønnessen, M. (2009) “On Contrapuntuality, Semiotic niche vs. ontological niche, The case of the Scandinavian wolf population”, paper given at Contrapuntuality - Gatherings in Biosemiotics, Prague

Proof-readings

The last few days I have conducted the final proof-reading of two texts of mine (second round), both of which are to be published within the next few weeks, as a book chapter and proceedings chapter respectively:
* I, Wolf: The Ecology of Existence (22pp)
* Mapping Human Impact: Expanding Horizons - Interdisciplinary Integration (18s)

Mapping human impact revised

Some hours ago I finished revising my article "Mapping human impact: Expanding horizons - Interdisciplinary integration", cf. previous posts, for the forthcoming CECT II proceedings. In the process I have added approximately 1.000 words (but removed 4 figures).

Outline:

Intro

Qualities and quantities

Ecological footprint and ontological niche: Two complementary approaches

Development of ontological maps

On interpreting numerical data qualitatively

/

Abstract:

At a general level, the recurring topic of this article is the opposition and complementarity of qualitative and quantitative aspects of empirical data. In particular, an attempt is made to develop means to qualify quantitative data. More particularly, however, the aim of the current text is to investigate the extent of human impact in nature in contemporary times – or more precisely to evaluate proposed representations thereof. The theoretical perspective stems from ecosemiotics and biosemiotics, with special emphasis on a phenomenological reading of Jakob von Uexküll.

An important component of this contribution consists of a discussion of the merits and shortcomings of two methodologies – the ecological footprint (a common tool in policy-making) and the ontological niche (the author's own coinage based on the theory of ecosemiotics). One of the main objectives of the developers of the ecological footprint concept was to make the general public and policy-makers aware of excessive resource use. While that is estimable in its right context, the author proposes that the ontological niche concept can complement the ecological footprint notion by covering aspects of the environmental problématique which for conceptual reasons the former cannot cover. Overcoming the ecological crisis requires awareness of the global dimension and the resource situation, but also of the personal, experiential aspects of our current predicament – our personal involvement in humankind’s material engagement in the ecosystems. The texture of reality is what is ultimately at stake here, and the ontological niche notion is introduced so as to emphasize our embedded, rather than detached, position in the world of the living.

The basic motion in this text is that from self to world. Exemplifying what the ontological niche amounts to, the author provides ontological maps ranging from the social relations of one individual to a rough sketch of the global ecological situation. In a concluding section the general problem of interpreting numerical data qualitatively is approached by way of three steps: (1) Determining existence status, (2) Determining the character of the relation and (3) Translating numerical data to characterizing terms.

Mapping human impact delivered

The second last night I further finished my article "Mapping human impact - Expanding horizons: Interdisciplinary integration" (17pp) where, for one thing, I criticise the ecological footprint concept.

/

The article will partake in proceedings from the second CECT autumn conference, and is in part based on my presentation there. Proceedings will likely appear in Geografiska annalar, published by the Swedish Society for Anthropology and Geography.

Contents:

Ecological footprint vs. ontological niche

Interpreting numerical data qualitatively

Development of ontological maps

Expanding horizons: Interdisciplinary integration

Today, at 2-4, I presented "Expanding horizons: Interdisciplinary integration", previously entitled "Methodological challenges in analyzing wolf ecology and wolf management within a semiotic-phenomenological framework" (a 30 min talk, accompanying Timo Maran's "Zoosemiotics: Disciplinary identity and methodological perspectives" (a good overview, with historical perspective)). The occasion was a seminar called "Methodology of the humanities", at University of Tartu (led by Peeter Torop).

Above: Sketch of a global ontological map (humankind in the center).

Poster presentation presentation

My poster "Mapping human impact: Ecological footprint vs. ontological niche" is on display at the second CECT autumn conference, "Spatiality, memory and visualisation of culture/nature relationships", tomorrow from 4 to 6 p.m. The 5 minute oral presentation of my poster presentation has been scheduled for 17.00-17.05. Full poster programme here.

Mapping human impact

My poster presentation for the Oct. 22-24 Tallinn conference on Spatiality, memory and visualization of human/nature relations (text only):

Morten Tønnessen: Mapping Human Impact

Ecological Footprint

vs.

Ontological Niche

In this presentation I compare my ecosemiotic concept of a human ontological niche (cf. Tønnessen 2009) with the concept of an ecological footprint, with respect to how either of these can be applied as tools in mapping human impact in nature. An ontological niche – a concept derived from Jakob von Uexküll’s Umwelt concept – can be defined as the set (or whole) of ecological relations (or ‘contrapuntal relations’, be they somatic, social or ecological) a being or life form partakes in at a certain point in natural history (figure: early version (1920) of Uexküll’s functional cycle).

(fig.)

The ecological footprint concept, on its hand, first introduced in 1996, is now being used by WWF (Living Planet Report) and developed methodologically by the Global Footprint Network. Claimed to be a tool that makes sustainability measurable, it condenses a complex array of consumption down into a single number.

The developers of the ecological footprint model stress that it includes only those aspects of resource consumption and waste production for which the Earth has regenerative capacity. What it does is converting consumption into the land used in production, along with the land theoretically needed to sequester the greenhouse gases produced. By dividing ‘Humanity’s Ecological Footprint’ (currently 2,7 ‘global hectares’ per person) by ‘World Biocapacity’ – which is (oftentimes) modelled as being constant – we arrive at the conclusion that humanity as a whole has been unsustainable (accumulating ‘ecological debt’) since the late 80s. When the footprint of a country does not surpass its biocapacity, it is said to be sustainable.

(fig.)

As we can see in the WWF figures below, global biocapacity is modelled as being potentially decreasing (in case of sustained/accumulated ecological overshoot) or increasing (in case of proper management).

(fig.)

(fig.)

The ecological footprint model has several limitations, not least the fact that there are many environmental problems it cannot represent. It further says little or nothing about the intensity of land use. From an ethical point of view, it is biased toward anthropocentricism in assuming that ‘sustainability’ entails that humanity can exploit the Earth’s biocapacity fully. It is also anthropocentric from a methodological point of view, since it represents human consumption and ecosystem services only – both being purely human interests.

The human ontological niche concept, in contrast, is designed in order to display the ecological relations in which humanity partakes. As Nathan Fiala (2008: 519) remarks, “better measures of sustainability would address [environmental issues] directly”. Whereas the simplicity of the ecological footprint is not only its greatest advantage but also its greatest disadvantage, the human ontological niche concept is better suited to account for variety within and across ecosystems, because its biggest advantage is its (qualitative, rather than quantitative) specificity. It further allows for disparate ethical assumptions.

I will now model selected global environmental data to demonstrate how the human ontological niche concept can be applied as a modelling tool scrutinizing human impact in nature. The basic problem is this: How can we model human impact in nature – a crude, aggregate measure – based on a theory of the phenomenological experiences of individual creatures (be they human or non-human)?

(fig.)

Above the global populations of selected livestock groups are represented in numerical terms (data taken from Livestock’s long shadow, FAO 2006). How could we represent these global data in qualitative terms?

(fig.)

Here a few differences in the size of circles (3 categories) and thickness (3 categories) are chosen to represent the relative importance of livestock groups and the character of our relations to them. In more general terms some crucial traditional features of the human ontological niche can be represented as depicted below (note that a positive attitude to conservation can change the quality of our relation to big carnivores as well as to “wasteland” species).

(fig.)

A few simple comments:

Resources/individuals: While an ecological footprint approach tends to focus on biomass (natural creatures qua resources), an ontological niche approach will tend to focus on individuals/subjects, wherever there are individuals.

Relative/Absolute: From a phenomenological point of view everything is relative to the subjects. But absolute numbers (i.e. the totals relative to the entire Earth system) matter too.

Qualitative/quantitative: Quantitative data must be analyzed in qualitative (oversight) terms. But qualities alone tell as little about a concrete empirical situation as quantities alone. Volume matters – and so does the quality (nature) of our ecological relations!

Simplifying/re-presenting complexity: All modelling entails simplification. What is decisive is that qualitative analysis at all steps is to guide quantitative representations, and that alienating decontextualization is to be avoided.

References

→ Livestock’s long shadow: Environmental issues and options. FAO 2006.

→ Living Planet Report 2008. WWF.

→ Fiala, Nathan 2008. Measuring sustain-ability: Why the ecological footprint is bad economics and bad environmental science. Ecological Economics 67: 519-525.

→ Tønnessen, Morten 2009. Umwelt transitions: Uexküll and environmental change. Biosemiotics 2.1: 47-64.

→ Uexküll, Jakob von 1920. Theoretische Biologie (first edition). Berlin: Julius Springer.

This poster presentation has been carried out as part of the research projects The Cultural Heritage of Environmental Spaces: A Comparative Analysis between Estonia and Norway (EEA–ETF Grant EMP 54), Dynamical Zoosemiotics and Animal Representations (ETF/ESF 7790) and Methods of Biosemiotics (ETF/ESF 6669).

Poster presentation on the notion of ecological footprints

I am in the process of preparing my poster presentation for the CECT (Center of excellence in cultural theory) II conference "Spatiality, memory and visualisation of culture/nature relationships: theoretical aspects", entitled "Mapping human impact: Ecological footprint vs. ontological niche".

Names of all poster presentations are to be found here, abstracts of oral presentations here.