According to my Google Scholar profile my research has to date attracted a total of 1.660 citations (+13 since July 31st). This includes 96 citations so far in 2026 (+11 since July 31st). My h-index remains 22 while my i10-index is now 48 (+1 since July 31st).
My 48th text to reach 10 citations appears to be "Introduction to the Special Issue Semiotics of Perception Being in the World of the Living—Semiotic Perspectives", co-written with Kati Lindström (2010).
Today, on my way back to Stavanger from Oslo, I have had an article writing day devoted to finishing my article "Prolegomena to lifeworld-oriented studies of contested climate pasts and futures", which I have now submitted to a special issue of Journal of Cognitive Historiography about "Cognition and Evolution in Historical and Social Research". In the process I added 2.058 words to the manuscript - making this the most productive writing day so far this year in terms of words written. This brings the number of writing days so far this Spring up to 46,5, including 29 article writing days.
Today I have had an article writing day, with some 1.000 words added to my article "Prolegomena to lifeworld-oriented studies of contested climate pasts and futures", which is aimed for a special issue of Journal of Cognitive Historiography about "Cognition and Evolution in Historical and Social Research". This brings the number of writing days so far this Spring up to 43, including 25,5 article writing days.
Today I´ve had half an article writing day, with some 300 words added to the manuscript of my article "Prospective lifeworld-oriented studies of contested climate pasts and futures". This brings the number of writing days so far this Spring up to 32, including 22,5 article writing days.
Today I´ve had what ended up as half an article writing day, with some rearrangement of writing day plans done, some 100 words added to my book review of Interpreting, Communication and Animal Welfare for Biosemiotics, and some 100 words added to my manuscript "Prospective lifeworld-oriented studies of contested climate pasts and futures" which is aimed for a special issue of Journal of Cognitive Historiography about "Cognition and Evolution in Historical and Social Research".
This brings the number of writing days so far this Spring up to 31, including 22 article writing days. In April, I logged only 5,5 writing days (specifically, 4,5 article writing days and 1 book writing day), and 812 words written.
Today I´ve had what ended up as half an article writing day, with some work done on my book review of Interpreting, Communication and Animal Welfare for Biosemiotics and some initial work done on my climate change-themed article for a special issue of Journal of Cognitive Historiography, work-titled "Prospective lifeworld-oriented studies of contested climate pasts and futures". I also rearranged my writing plans for the next few weeks.
This brings the number of writing days so far this Spring up to 26,5, including 18 article writing days.
I have been notified that my proposed paper "Climate economics imaginaries and the contested future of economic growth" has been rejected and will thus not be included in the journal Œconomia – History / Methodology / Philosophy's forthcoming special issue "History of Climate Economics".
Today I have had an article writing day, with some 600 words written in the process of composing an extended abstract for the article now titled "Climate economics imaginaries and the contested future of economic growth", which I have submitted to a special issue on the history of climate economics of the journal Œconomia – History / Methodology / Philosophy. This brings the number of writing days so far this Spring up to 4,5, including 3,5 article writing days.
As mentioned in a previous post, in the end of August I prepared an abstract in relation to an upcoming special issue of The Journal of Ethics on the theme "Climate ethics: Prospects and Retrospectives", titled "The ethical case against Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS)". I have now been notified that my paper has not been selected for inclusion in the special issue.
Today I have had half an article writing day, partly devoted to work on the revision of the book chapter manuscript "Steffens´ early outlook reconsidered: Nature conceptions of the industrial-age Anthropocene", with some 100 words added to the manuscript in the process. I also accepted to contribute with two entries in a prospective special issue (journal to be agreed) titled "CONTRADICTionary: An Almanac of Resistance", which will be organised around the ca. 200 words the Trump administration is attempting to ban from science.
So far this Spring I have had 29 writing days, including 5 article writing days.
Today I discovered that my 2023 article "Wasted GDP in the USA" has been included in another collection by Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, where it appeared, namely the collection "Top 50 papers: 2015-2024". The collection was released January 20th 2025.
"The articles have been selected based on a combination of metrics (citation counts, downloads and Altmetric scores)", according to the journal. The collection features "some of this journal’s most impactful and accessed research from the past decade". Altogether the journal appears to have published about 4.000 articles over its first decade.
My article is one of 15 articles published in the past three years (2022-2024) that have been included in the collection.
My article "Applied umwelt theory in the context of phenomenological triangulation and descriptive phenomenology" has now been published, as part of the special issue "Umwelt theory".
Reference:
— Tønnessen, Morten 2024. Applied umwelt theory in the context of phenomenological triangulation and descriptive phenomenology. Sign Systems Studies 52 (3/4) (special issue “Umwelt theory”, eds. Riin Magnus and Nelly Mäekivi): 315–343. https://doi.org/10.12697/SSS.2024.52.3-4.02
Today, during sick leave, I have had half an article writing day, mostly devoted to checking the proofs of my article "Applied umwelt theory in the context of phenomenological triangulation and descriptive phenomenology" which will appear in a special issue of Sign Systems Studies about applications of Umwelt theory shortly.
So far this Autumn I have had 36 writing days including 17 article writing days.
Alexei Sharov has written a farewell editorial for Biosemiotics, for which he has been an Editor-in-Chief for about 10 years. The editorial is entitled "Following developments of biosemiotics", and includes some passages I really appreciate mentioning me, our joint work, and some initiatives of mine.
"Many prominent scientists and philosophers in biosemiotics, such as Kalevi Kull, Jesper Hoffmeyer, Donald Favareau, Howard Pattee, Karel Kleisner, Prisca Augustyn, Morten Tønnessen, Anton Markoš, Stanley Salthe, Bruce Weber, Frederik Stjernfelt, Paul Cobley and others, supported the journal and published their articles in the initial years."
"In 2014, Marcello Barbieri transferred most of editorial duties to a new team of editors, that included me, Timo Maran, and Morten Tønnessen, and we took full charge as Editors-in-Chief in 2015. Our first joint editorial titled “Towards Synthesis of Biology and Semiotics” outlined our vision of the state and future of biosemiotics and its representation in this journal. We wrote:
The main idea of biosemiotics is that life and semiosis are coextensive. Here semiosis is understood as a sign process or sign exchange, where signs stand for something else in some respect or capacity. In particular, life has a semiotic nature because it is based on endless interpretation of environmental cues and transfer of life-related functional meanings vertically across generations and horizontally to neighboring organisms. Semiotic processes help organisms to perform their functions, preserve their habits and pursue their agendas through generations (Sharov et al., 2015): 1–2).""I am thankful to Morten Tønnessen for suggesting two new activities that helped to invigorate the relations between the journal and readers. First, it was the establishment of the Annual Biosemiotic Achievement Award in 2014 for the novelty and relevance to biosemiotics. And the second was the Biosemiotics Glossary Project, which started with the article on semiotic agency (Tønnessen, 2015), and then continued the discussion with the terms: umwelt, semiotic threshold, and intentionality. An important part of this project is answering questionnaires and statistical analysis of results which reflects the range of opinions within the biosemiotics field."
"Also we published the special issues “Can quantitative approaches develop bio/semiotic theory?” edited by Dan Faltýnek and Ľudmila Lacková, “Agency and (the Built) Environment” by Tim Ireland and Paul Cobley, “Biosemiotics of waste” by Yogi Hendlin, and “Umwelt Theory and Phenomenology” by Carlo Brentari and Morten Tønnessen."
"I enjoyed my work as Editor-in-Chief of Biosemiotics for many reasons. First, biosemiotics has been my major interest and activity for 36 years, although I combined it with my regular jobs in ecology, molecular biology, and bioinformatics. Second, I like helping young authors to improve their manuscripts, as well as interacting with reviewers. And third, my editorial job stimulated reading related publications, and I learned about new discoveries and theories in various fields of biology and the humanities. This knowledge helped me to write a book together with Morten Tønnessen Semiotic agency: Science beyond mechanism (Sharov & Tønnessen, 2021)."
Biosemiotics´ special issue "Umwelt theory and phenomenology", which is guest-edited by Carlo Brentari and me, has now been published as volume 17, issue 2 of the journal. The special issue features an editorial and 15 original research articles, and spans over pp. 265-585 of volume 17 (321 pp).
Updated, complete references:
— Brentari, Carlo & Morten Tønnessen (2024). Introduction to the Special Issue ‘Umwelt Theory and Phenomenology’. Editorial. Biosemiotics 17(2): 265–272. Published online July 19th 2024. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-024-09583-w
— Brentari, Carlo & Morten Tønnessen (guest editors, 2024). “Umwelt theory and phenomenology”. Special issue of Biosemiotics, vol. 17, no. 2 (August 2024). https://link.springer.com/journal/12304/volumes-and-issues/17-2
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The issue also contains 9 more articles which are not part of the special issue. This includes my correspondence text "Understanding subjecthood and experience", first published online in March. Updated and complete reference:
— Tønnessen, Morten (2024). Understanding subjecthood and experience. Correspondence. Biosemiotics 17(2): 733–735. Published online March 15th 2024. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-024-09557-y
Today I have made the last few edits in my revision of the article "Applied Umwelt theory in the context of phenomenological triangulation and descriptive phenomenology", with some 100 words added to the text. I have now resubmitted the manuscript to Sign Systems Studies.
Today I have had half an article writing day devoted to the revision of my article "Applied Umwelt theory in the context of phenomenological triangulation and descriptive phenomenology", with some 150 words written in net terms. So far this Autumn I have had 4 writing days including 2 article writing days and 2 book writing days.
Today I have had an article writing day devoted to revising my article for a special issue of Sign Systems Studies and titled "Applied Umwelt theory in the context of phenomenological triangulation and descriptive phenomenology", with some 400 words written. So far this Autumn I have had 2,5 writing days.
Today I have had half an article writing today, with some 500 words added to the editorial "Introduction to the Special Issue ‘Umwelt Theory and Phenomenology’" which I am co-writing with Carlo Brentari in relation to the forthcoming special issue of Biosemiotics we are guest editors for. So far this Spring I have had 44 writing days.
