A Theory of General Semiotics : The Science of Signs, Sign-Systems, and Semiotic Reality [1 ed.] 9781443882323, 9781443877183

Citation preview

A Theory of General Semiotics

A Theory of General Semiotics: The Science of Signs, Sign-Systems, and Semiotic Reality By

Abraham Solomonick English Editor: Libby Schwartz

A Theory of General Semiotics: The Science of Signs, Sign-Systems, and Semiotic Reality By Abraham Solomonick This book first published 2015 Cambridge Scholars Publishing Lady Stephenson Library, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2PA, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2015 by Abraham Solomonick All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-7718-2 ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-7718-3

This book is dedicated to the memory of Prof. Anatoly Karmin, whose friendship and support encouraged me to develop and publicize my theory of general semiotics.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Foreword ................................................................................ xii Part I. General Introduction Chapter One ............................................................................. 2 The Role of Signs in Our World The evolution of sign usage .................................................................. 4 Conclusions......................................................................................... 11

Chapter Two ........................................................................... 14 Why We Need General Semiotics Whence the division between general and branch semiotics? ............ 14 Proponents and opponents of a general theory ................................... 18 My view of the issue ........................................................................... 21

Chapter Three ......................................................................... 24 What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science? The philosophical underpinnings of a theory ...................................... 27 Formal axiomatization of a theory ...................................................... 30 Semiotic taxonomy and classifications ............................................... 31 Conceptual grid and terminology........................................................ 36 Metalanguages in science ................................................................... 37 Means of verifying sign processing .................................................... 38

Chapter Four .......................................................................... 42 Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics What is a sign and who benefits from it? ............................................ 42 A universe of symbolic meanings ....................................................... 46 Main functions of signs, sign-systems, and semiotic reality ............... 50 What do signs really designate? .......................................................... 58 The third type of reality: mental reality .............................................. 62

Table of Contents

viii

Chapter Five ........................................................................... 66 Signs, Symbols, and the Four Branches of Semiotics The kind of symbols I have in mind ................................................... 66 How symbols differ from usual signs ................................................. 69 Summary ............................................................................................. 74

Part II. On Signs Chapter Six ............................................................................. 78 Signs in their Semantic Aspect Chief properties of signs ..................................................................... 78 The nature of signification .................................................................. 86 A new model of a sign ........................................................................ 94 Integration of the three sources in a sign ............................................ 95 Ontological reasons for creating new signs ........................................ 97 Semiotic reasons for creating new signs ............................................. 98

Chapter Seven ...................................................................... 102 Signs in their Syntactic Aspect What is syntax?................................................................................. 102 Levels of syntax ................................................................................ 105 Basic signs in sign-systems ............................................................... 110 How new basic signs are introduced ................................................. 112 Syntactic rules for processing signs in a sign-system ....................... 117 Functional signs ................................................................................ 123

Chapter Eight ....................................................................... 128 Signs in their Pragmatic Aspect The human mind develops by mastering signs ................................. 128 People seek to live among their favorite signs .................................. 131 Quick reactions to signs we come across .......................................... 132 The human factor in creating new signs and sign-systems ............... 133 The human factor in restoring old sign-systems ............................... 135 In Sum............................................................................................... 137

A Theory of General Semiotics

ix

Chapter Nine ........................................................................ 138 Degree of Abstraction in Signs Abstraction as “distance” from referents .......................................... 138 A second gauge of the abstraction of signs ....................................... 141 What is the “degree of abstraction” of signs? ................................... 142 The predominance of syntax in abstract systems .............................. 145 Predefined notation and abstract sign-systems ................................. 146 Different methods of verification ...................................................... 147 Visuality in signs .............................................................................. 148 Two qualities of signs that show their highly abstract nature ........... 151

Part III. On Sign-Systems Chapter Ten .......................................................................... 158 What Exactly Is a Sign-System? What is a “system” in general? ......................................................... 158 Classifying sign-systems ................................................................... 163

Chapter Eleven ..................................................................... 183 The Logic of Creating and Processing Sign-Systems The search for appropriate signs for new systems ............................ 183 Signs as taxons in scientific theories................................................. 185 Predictive power of sign-systems ..................................................... 185 Types of logic used with sign-systems.............................................. 187

Chapter Twelve .................................................................... 195 On Merged Signs Definition of merged signs................................................................ 195 Mergers help us work with abstract signs ......................................... 198 How mergers are created .................................................................. 199 Constructing a merged sign to replace a wordy explanation............. 201 Building a higher level of signs above an existing level ................... 203 Adding supplementary features to an existing sign .......................... 206 The main features of mergers............................................................ 208 Manipulating compounds.................................................................. 211 Manipulating different parts of compounds ...................................... 212

x

Table of Contents

Chapter Thirteen .................................................................. 221 Levels of Syntactic Rules The morphological level: the choice of basic signs .......................... 221 Morphological paradigms ................................................................. 226 Syntactic levels above morphological paradigms ............................. 228

Chapter Fourteen .................................................................. 236 Semiotic Fields, Fragments, and Orientation Marks Semiotic fields and their properties .................................................. 237 Fragments in the semiotic field ......................................................... 240 Orientation marks ............................................................................. 242 The role of geometric figures in defining semiotic fields ................. 243 Syntactic framework of Morse code ................................................. 245 A note on terminology ...................................................................... 246

Chapter Fifteen ..................................................................... 247 Types of Sign-Systems Overlapping types of sign-systems ................................................... 247 Appeal of particular types of sign-systems ....................................... 252 The role of languages in the hierarchy of sign-system types ............ 253

Part IV. On Semiotic Reality Chapter Sixteen .................................................................... 258 What Is Semiotic Reality? An initial approach to defining semiotic reality ................................ 258 How semiotic reality is created ......................................................... 260 The forms of signs in semiotic reality ............................................... 263 Logic and semiotic reality ................................................................. 274 Dissemination of knowledge through semiotic reality ...................... 280

Chapter Seventeen................................................................ 285 Some Functions of Semiotic Reality Revealing new knowledge ................................................................ 285 Honing signs and sign-systems ......................................................... 289 Advancing scientific research ........................................................... 295 Transplanting semiotic systems into new environments ................... 298 Supporting traditional behavior ........................................................ 305

A Theory of General Semiotics

xi

Part V. Supplements Supplement I ........................................................................ 308 Feedback on My Semiotic Theory The appraisal of D. S. Nazarkin ........................................................ 309 The dissertation of Ahmad Jaffar ...................................................... 309 M. Urban incorporates my ideas into his methodology .................... 312 Another mathematical confirmation of the theory ............................ 313 Confirmation from juristic language ................................................. 314 Approval from culturologists ............................................................ 315

Supplement II ....................................................................... 317 Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics Cartosemiotics .................................................................................. 317 Philosophical issues of a semiotic character ..................................... 323 Semiodidactics .................................................................................. 333

Supplement III...................................................................... 351 Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms Supplement IV ..................................................................... 398 Previously Published Works on Semiotics

FOREWORD

I had my first glimpse of semiotics in the summer of 1983. At the time, I was preparing for a sabbatical year and, as part of my preparations, I applied to the International Summer Institute for Structural and Semiotic Studies, a program of Indiana University-Bloomington. I had read some of the papers that had been published by the institute, and felt that they dealt with something very similar to what I was interested in investigating. As an educationalist, I had taught foreign languages to children (in Russia) and adults (in Israel). What concerned me were some issues related to the methodology of teaching foreign languages. In particular, I had observed that when we taught foreign languages to children, we always began with a visual exposition of the words we were presenting, but when we taught adults, that type of introduction frequently did not work well. I wondered why this was the case. I had hoped to be able to spend some of my sabbatical at the Indiana University institute, researching this and other topics pertaining to the teaching of foreign languages to children and adults. Although the institute was unable to invite me to the center to undertake my project, they did invite me to take part in a seminar on semiotics that they were sponsoring that summer in Portugal, and I happily agreed to attend. It was the invitation to this seminar that first introduced me to the notion of semiotics in scientific discourse, and the seminar itself was something of a turning point in my professional life. The beautiful environment and the general atmosphere were so appealing, and the intellectual potential of both the participants and the lecturers was so great, that it was

A Theory of General Semiotics

xiii

a pleasure to be involved in the activities there. The organizers invited some of the most prominent professionals in a variety of fields to lecture on the role of signs in their fields. What attracted my attention most at the seminar was the fact that each field defined and made use of its own semiotic concepts, and these concepts were never assembled together into any sort of comprehensive whole that could serve as a common framework for them all. There was a very interesting lecture on ethnography and the signs that were identified in its oldest artifacts; but the topic was presented in ethnographic terms and obviously belonged to that science. I asked the lecturer if she presented the topic at meetings of ethnographers using the same terminology and concepts, and she affirmed that she did. When I asked her what was specifically semiotic in the whole process, she could not give me a clear answer; she merely thought that it was inherently obvious. The same thing happened when a prominent lecturer from Germany gave a presentation on educational issues concerning how young children learn to draw. Finally, there was a lecture on bull-fighting, in which the lecturer spoke of the standard procedures involved in that realm and the traditional, established way in which they were performed. He treated these standardized behaviors as signs. In each of these cases, I was introduced to signs as they existed in particular surroundings, but what they had in common – what could properly be called semiotic about them – remained concealed. The semiotic sense of the matter evaded me completely. Each topic clearly belonged to the field in which it came into existence, and remained strongly entrenched in that realm. This problem has remained with me ever since my first introduction to semiotics at that seminar, and it has colored my semiotic approach throughout. Later on, I attempted to create this common ground myself. I named the

xiv

Foreword

framework I developed general semiotics, because I wanted to highlight the distinction between it and what I called branch semiotics – namely, the independent systems of semiotics that exist within any branch of science other than semiotics proper. My efforts led me to create an entirely new science, one that was constructed outside of all the other established branches of science and had its own distinct paradigm. The process of formulating the foundations of this science of general semiotics took me about twenty years. During that time, I wrote and published more than ten monographic works on the topic (including some that were only published on the internet), as well as innumerable articles, and I spoke at a large number of forums. Needless to say, various aspects of general semiotics are at the heart of all of my works. After those twenty years of intense activity, I think the time has come to summarize my work on general semiotics, systematically constructing and presenting it so that all those who are interested can learn about it and judge it on its own merits. To this end, I have composed this book. For general semiotics to successfully achieve the goals I set for myself when I set out to develop it, I believe it must satisfy three requirements: 1. It must be built upon the achievements of branch semiotics 2. It must have a specific and more or less complete structure 3. It must provide all concrete branch semiotics with a solid foundation and a set of practical instructions that can be applied to them. Whether these requirements are met in this book is something you must judge for yourselves after you have read it.

PART I. GENERAL INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER ONE THE ROLE OF SIGNS IN OUR WORLD

As humans, we are all immersed in a profusion of signs. This is not something we actually feel – just as we are not aware of the air we breathe, we are not cognizant of the signs that surround us – but without signs we could hardly take a single step, much less perform a purposeful chain of actions. When we wake up, before we even get out of bed, we usually check the time on a clock. A clock is a device that employs signs to show us the time; and time-measurement itself is a system of signs created by people to help them organize their time. After we check the time, the next thing we are likely to do is gather information about the weather. We may collect this information from the radio; or we may look at a thermometer hanging outside our window. Which way we choose to gather the information is not important at the moment. What is important is that we find and comprehend signs that tell us about the weather (the words of the weather report, or the numbers on the thermometer), and we make decisions based on these signs: we dress in appropriate clothing, bring an umbrella along with us, or take other precautions in order to be prepared for the vicissitudes of the climate. Soon after this, we may leave our home and walk towards our car. As we walk, we perceive various signs that tell us about the car’s current state. For example, we see that its lights are off, so we understand that the engine is not running. Subsequently, we perform other actions in order to prepare the car for a trip. These actions also involve signs: the sound of the engine igniting as we turn the key in the ignition tells us

The Role of Signs in Our World

3

the engine is now on; a light on the dashboard tells us the headlights are on; a label on a button indicates that pressing the button will turn the rear defogger on. As we continue through the day, we encounter and assimilate more and more signs. In fact, all of our actions are imbued with our analyses of the signs we discern, and these signs pave the way for us to respond appropriately at every juncture. Not only do our everyday pursuits completely depend on signs, our mental activities nearly always rely on them as well. To be sure, not everything we do is governed by signs. There is also an emotional sphere, which is primarily built upon feelings; and there are instinctive responses, which are either inborn or internalized after intensive training. Yet even these realms are supported by a substrate of mental control that is founded on the use of signs. Whenever our automatic responses are put on hold, we turn to our mental constructs, which are built on logic (a system of signs) and external signs, for guidance. Lastly, there are hugely important domains that are exclusively composed of signs: we speak with words, write with letters, orient ourselves in space with maps and charts, play music and sing by reading notes, and so on. All of these are signs. In fact, the list of human activities that rely almost entirely on signs is virtually endless. All of this gives us the right to call human beings “symbolic creatures,” because we make such extensive use of signs – employing existing objects as signs, and also creating new items to specifically serve as signs. The notion of a “symbolic creature” was coined by the German philosopher Ernst Cassirer (1874-1945) at the beginning of the last century. With this idea, he differentiated humans from all other living creatures. In my view, Cassirer was right on the mark when he made this point. We really do differ from all other living things, as well

4

Chapter One

as from inanimate objects; and, first and foremost, we differ from them in the ways we use and produce signs.

The evolution of sign usage Although people today are certainly “symbolic creatures,” this was not always the case. At earlier stages in the evolution and development of human beings, people did not use signs as we do today. We can divide the history of evolution on our planet into five stages, based on the relationships between signs and the most evolutionarily advanced entities extant at each stage. By tracing the path of evolution from stage to stage, we can build a sort of ladder of development of sign usage. Stage 1: Inanimate matter The first evolutionary stage precedes the emergence of living organisms, when only inanimate objects existed. Inanimate objects can interact with other objects (both living and non-living). They can be influenced by them and exert their counterinfluence upon them. As a result of these interactions, they may be changed, mutilated, and even destroyed. But inanimate objects cannot envisage signs, because they cannot envisage anything – they are not alive. Nor can they respond to signs in any direct way. In spite of this, sign-less, inert matter managed, under certain specific conditions, to give birth to the first primitive living organisms. How could this have happened? People have proposed two kinds of answers to this question. The first is very simple, and seemingly “obvious.” It says that there is some external source, independent of us, that is omnipotent and that created our world. People call this force God. This constitutes the religious approach to the problem.

The Role of Signs in Our World

5

In humanity’s early days, this solution was considered selfevident, and was accepted by all of the people on earth. The second approach to answering this question is much more complicated, and it appeared later in human history than the first one. Those who adopted this approach looked for forces of nature that, as a result of their own internal development, changed themselves into what we see today. This approach is based on science and on a high valuation of human ingenuity – namely, on the premise that people can acquire knowledge by surveying the things around them, understanding their essence, and changing them to their advantage. I personally accept this second point of view. I am presenting it here in part because this approach is founded on signs. According to this latter approach, there must be conditions under which living matter can emerge from lifeless objects. I believe that the first and foremost condition is that the inanimate objects must be amassed into a “system.” This state of being is opposed to a “heap” – a random collection of things. You cannot accommodate yourself to a heap, because it is not in any predictable order. A system, by contrast, is predictable; in it, one can identify causes and effects, and living organisms can adjust themselves to these factors. Our solar system is an example of a combination of causes and effects of this sort: it is clearly structured, its parts behave in a consistent manner, and it has a constant source of energy from the sun. When single-celled creatures appeared in this system, they could find ways to adapt themselves to the existing conditions. This is how life began. Stage 2: The vegetable kingdom To be deemed a living organism, an entity must have certain basic properties – features that distinguish it from inanimate matter. It must have a cellular structure, and that structure must include a reproductive mechanism. It must also

6

Chapter One

have a device of some sort that captures external signals and responds to them. In the inanimate world, the basic composite particle is an atom; in the organic world, it is a cell. Every living organism must consist of at least one cell. The earliest, simplest living creature most likely belonged to the vegetable kingdom, because members of the animal kingdom require oxygen in order to live, and vegetation is the primary source of oxygen. Furthermore, of all living organisms, vegetables are the simplest in terms of how they deal with signs. Thus, the next stage in our ladder of development, after inanimate matter, consists of plants and vegetation in general. Vegetables respond to signs, but only to a very small number of them, and only in a very primitive way. A plant can only survive in a specific type of environment. Every individual plant chooses its own environment, and adapts itself to that environment. Some of these adaptive mechanisms are then transmitted to the following generations. The scarcity of signs that are detectable by plants is the result of plants’ immobility. They are fixed in the same place throughout their lifespans, so they do not actively seek signals from outside of themselves. Only signs that reach them by chance manage to attract their attention. These stimuli are more signals than real signs, and plants’ responses to them are essentially automatic reactions that are inherited by the plants from their ancestors. Inasmuch as plants are alive, they must have some mechanism through which they reproduce. Some of them reproduce through their roots – that is, by simple cell division. But others use more advanced methods, regenerating by means of seeds that are disseminated by the wind or by insects. In these latter cases, we can identify male and female gametes that merge together to impregnate a zygote. On the ladder of de-

The Role of Signs in Our World

7

velopment, these plants are slightly above the others, closer to the next class of living organisms. Stage 3: Animals This class of animals includes microorganisms, insects, reptiles, fish, birds, mammals, and other non-human creatures – any organism that can move from place to place in order to seek out food, drink, copulation, and living facilities. Naturally, these organisms are much better at adapting to their environments than vegetables are, because they can search for new and potentially useful signs as they move from place to place; and they often find them. When they find such signs, they learn to look for them again in the future, so that they can better accommodate themselves to new and otherwise unpredictable conditions. Their success in gaining new benefits from nature is what drives their progress, both physically and mentally. Nonetheless, in this respect the abilities of even the most advanced animals cannot compare with those of humans. Animals are already specialized, and they cannot escape the boundaries of their innate specializations. You can think of the process of specialization as the building of a stone staircase. In this staircase, the stone that serves as the third step cannot also be used as the fourth step; the only way you could use it as the fourth step is by destroying the previous step or the whole structure, and then rebuilding it. If a stem cell has evolved into a nose, it cannot become eyes or fingers. Improvements can only take place within the boundaries of a specific species and during a specific period of the organism’s development. This is why apes, dolphins, and even parrots cannot learn human language – they are limited not only by the scope of their minds, but also by the whole constitution of their bodies. This last factor places limits on the minds themselves and

8

Chapter One

prevents them from undergoing far-reaching alterations. Yet, within these limitations, animals, especially highly developed ones, are exceedingly capable of perceiving different signs and responding to them appropriately. Some animals are even better equipped in this respect than men. Dogs have better smelling capabilities than humans; which is why we use dogs to help us find concealed things by smell. Yet animals are very limited in their abilities to invent new signs, and they are unable to conceive the real nature of signs as representatives of something different from themselves. We humans are the only ones in the world to understand the real nature of signs and to create new signs of various degrees of abstraction and complexity. For animals, signs essentially remain more like signals than like the signs humans employ; they learn to react appropriately to some of these signals, but they do not advance in their use of signs beyond this level. Stage 4: Signs truly belong to humans Unlike animals, we humans are real inventors of signs, and we are also their devoted adherents. We create signs of varying levels of abstraction, and the more abstract they are, the more force they seem to hold within them. The most abstract of our signs are powerful structures, mighty in their profundity and in the strength that comes from generalization. Our abstract signs are so potent that we can reach important conclusions about the world around us just by manipulating the signs, without referring to the material objects they represent at all during the entire process; all we require to validate the conclusions is to obtain empirical confirmation later on. We also use signs for the creation of what we call culture. Initially, we did this using oral signs. Then we invented writing and used it to transmit our cultural achievements to later generations. Furthermore, not a single scientific research project can be completed without using signs to clarify our inten-

The Role of Signs in Our World

9

tions, define our plans, and denote our progress. There is no such thing as a new idea that can be expressed without signs. Signs are necessary both to clarify our own thoughts and to transmit them to other people. Not only do we create separate signs, we also unceasingly construct newer and mightier signsystems, which help us in all of our endeavors. Of the many thousands of systems that humans have constructed based on signs, we need only mention systems of writing, drawing, technical drawing, musical notations, and mathematical symbols, to illustrate the importance of signs for human progress. Finally, and most importantly, we ourselves progress as we invent and use new signs and sign-systems. Over the generations, our signs and sign-systems have become more and more abstract and all-encompassing, and with them, our minds have become more sophisticated, skilled, and able to cope with more complicated tasks. It is indisputably clear that humanity has become cleverer as we have acquired the ability to develop more abstract and ingenious ideas. Stage 5: Signs for machines As humanity created and employed ever more abstract signs, we came to the realization that we can relegate some of our less important tasks to inanimate devices – to machines that we endow with certain human qualities. These machines can accomplish some purely human tasks no less effectively than we can ourselves, thus sparing us both time and effort. For this purpose, we create devices that respond to certain problems exactly as we ourselves would. That is, we endow these devices with signs. This is the final step in our ladder of development. Consider, for example, the lengthy history of human digging methods. At first, people dug into the ground with their hands. Then they began to use objects they found near their digging sites, like rocks or branches, to help them. After this,

10

Chapter One

they invented shovels of various types, and, much more recently, dredges and bulldozers. When we make use of the latter devices, we do not manually exert our physical force on them (as we do with shovels); rather, we send signals to the machines, and these signals serve as signs that cause the machines to respond in the appropriate manner. At each new stage in the development of digging tools, people implemented ever more effective means for digging, making the process quicker and less physically demanding. The same is true of the history of weaponry. Over time, weapons have become more and more sophisticated. Today, many are capable of pinpointing multiple signs, analyzing their interrelationships, and responding exactly as we would wish them to. These devices behave as if they were thinking entities, in spite of the fact that they are not actually thinking in the human sense. Nonetheless, certain types of human thinking are beyond the abilities of machines. Deep and authentic human thinking is necessary for dealing with options and alternatives. Our lives are so multifarious and diversified that it is rare for us to encounter situations for which only one decision is unequivocally reasonable. Because of this, we are accustomed to choosing one of many possible options for handling our problems. This is impossible when we implant signs in machines. They cannot make choices in the same manner as humans, considering pros and cons; they can only react to stimuli with a single response. Any potential for hesitation on the part of a machine must be removed by designing it in such a way that it implements one and only one specific response to any specific input. There is another striking difference between human thinking and the possible reactions of a machine to signs we introduce to it. Our thinking is synergistic – it is able to simultaneously grasp several dimensions and levels of a question. Ma-

The Role of Signs in Our World

11

chine “thinking” is exclusively linear – one step follows another sequentially. When we express our thoughts, either orally or in writing, we also present them linearly. This is because we are using signs (words or letters) to express them, and signs can only follow one another in strictly linear sequences, even when they are used to formulate multilevel mathematical formulas or rebuses. That is, on the horizontal plane of a sequence of signs, the progression is always linear. In human thinking there is also a vertical plane. When we think, we are able to grasp not only the linear structure implied by the order the signs, but also the meta-rules underlying this construction – the reasons we picked this particular design and not another one. Imagine a group of people walking in a park. They can automatically follow a well-trodden path to find the way out of the park, but they can also think of another route and use it, if they decide that it is a quicker and easier route. In the first case, they are handling the task of leaving the park linearly, but in the second, they are approaching it vertically. Machines, by contrast, never propose new meta-decisions like this; they always patiently follow the paths implanted in them by their designers. Whether “clever” machines will ever be created that will be able to understand the quantity and quality of signals understood by humans, and, if so, whether we will be able to bring them up to our level of thinking, is not clear. At present, what is clear is that the abyss between people and machines is huge and will not be bridged in the near and foreseeable future.

Conclusions From what I have said thus far, one can draw a number of preliminary conclusions. The main conclusion is that signs are very important for human beings, and, therefore, we should undertake additional research about them and endeavor to

12

Chapter One

know more about them than we know today. I am sorry to say that we currently know very little about them. To prove this thesis, you need only ask yourself if you have ever read anything about semiotics – the science of signs and sign-systems. I am sure that most of my readers have never heard anything about the topic and its ramifications. The situation was not always so gloomy; in ancient Greece, many philosophers were interested in the problem and wrote a great deal about it. Later on, and especially in modern times, people are simply unaware that semiotics exists and that it is worthy of scientific attention. Philosophers are busy delving into issues related to scientific research, but they only pay attention to two elements of the process – to the researchers and to the objects of their investigation – and look exclusively at the relationships between them. Signs as active participants in the process are neglected completely. This situation should be changed. A second conclusion concerns the way the situation should be changed. What is needed is to create a new field of study, general semiotics. Unlike the phenomena I call branch semiotics, which exist within particular sciences and professions and deal only with the semiotics of the fields to which they belong, general semiotics would be devoted to formulating laws and principles that are common to all semiotic systems. This is a subject I have dealt with a great deal throughout this book. A third conclusion is that each of the hundreds of existing systems of branch semiotics belongs to one of the four groups discussed above: semiotics of plants, semiotics of animals, semiotics of humans, and signs for machines. In my opinion, each of these groups should be studied separately, and scientists with different qualifications should deal with each of them. In this work, I will dwell mostly on the semiotics of humans. It may be that some of my ideas will also be relevant to some of the other groups, but, in general, it will not be easy

The Role of Signs in Our World

13

to apply them to semiotic domains other than the semiotics of human beings.

CHAPTER TWO WHY WE NEED GENERAL SEMIOTICS

Whence the division between general and branch semiotics? Historically, branch semiotics came into existence long before any general principles concerning signs and their systems were developed. The reason for this is obvious: concrete scientific disciplines could not take shape without the special signs they required. They could not wait for the birth of a general science that would provide them with theoretical principles for creating and using signs and sign-systems. Because of this, we only encounter formulations of the general principles of signs and sign-systems long after the first branches of science came into existence. Furthermore, because each of the systems of branch semiotics developed its foundations independently, no common principles took shape that could be applied to all of the systems. Since the various forms of branch semiotics seemed to be equal to the tasks for which they were created – chemical semiotics satisfied the needs of the developing field of chemistry, architectural semiotics met the evolving needs of architecture, etc. – no demand for a general system of semiotics ever arose in the scientific community. We can formulate this thesis better by saying that the development of each science was dependent on the signs that science produced for itself. No science could advance unless its signs developed along with it. Over time, scientists have

Why We Need General Semiotics

15

invested as much time and energy on introducing properly honed signs as they have on the creation of research methods and tools. Consider, for example, how much time and effort were expended on coining the standard system of chemical symbolism – on the symbols for elements, the formulas of molecules, their combinations in various reactions, etc. If this is the case, you may well ask what point there is in developing a general theory of semiotics. If the internal development of semiotic symbolism meets the needs of all the sciences, why bother trying to change things? Why not leave everything as it is? It is this question that we shall try to answer in this chapter. Since we cannot hope to analyze the development of signs in every sphere in which they are currently in use,1 we will focus on a few telling examples. One of the first sciences in which professionals applied signs was medicine. Although we know that signs were used as part of healing long before the Greco-Roman era, the earliest written sources we have that document the systematic utilization of signs for medical purposes are from ancient Greece and Rome. The collection of medical texts called the Hippocratic Corpus, which was composed in ancient Greece, includes a work called The Book of Prognostics. With carefully chosen details, this book lays out instructions for physicians about how best to observe and examine patients. In ancient Rome, those methods were further refined by the anatomist Galen. He was even more insistent than the Greeks had been that heedful observation of symptoms and signs was necessary for the accurate diagnosis of afflictions and disorders. This constituted an obvious digression from the usual practice among ancient peoples, who attempted healing mostly by calling upon gods and soliciting 1

Note that it is not only sciences that require the use of specific signs; every profession and practical occupation – carpentry, shoemaking, etc. – also has its own set of signs.

16

Chapter Two

aid from malevolent forces, in the belief that it was these agents that brought about maladies. Although archaic healing practices continued among primitive populations for thousands of years after Hippocrates and Galen introduced the scientific approach to diagnosing and treating medical problems, little by little, the scientific perspective prevailed. Today, most doctors hardly seem to raise their heads from their computer screens, culling their conclusions far more from the signs they see there than from personal observation of patients. Over time, the use of signs in medicine has steadily increased, and the methods employed to extract them have become more and more sophisticated, to the point where doctors themselves are unable to understand the curves and diagrams used to represent them and have to apply to specialists in cases requiring special treatment. The time will soon come when machines that work with signs will be able to diagnose conditions and prescribe their treatments more quickly and correctly than humans. In this way, we are gradually transferring our wisdom to electronic mechanisms. Consider another example, one that is more closely associated with my professional training and experience: linguistics. It is well known that the so-called natural languages developed spontaneously within each individual tribe and nation. They grew out of people’s need for communication and cooperation, and were created by trial and error. Only much later did the process I call “combing existing languages” occur. It is from this latter process that the science of linguistics came into existence. A special attitude towards words also emerged at this time: words came to be viewed as signs whose properties extended beyond their simple meanings. Linguists began analyzing words and their combinations, and from their conclusions, they created the first grammars. Special manuals were written for those wishing to learn established languages and dialects. In fact, dictionaries from circa 1000 BC have

Why We Need General Semiotics

17

been discovered: “In 1850 Hinks discovered that the Babylonian script on the clay tablets had been devised for another language, and Oppert gave that language the name we use now “Sumerian.” The Akkadians regarded it as their classical language and therefore taught it in their scribal schools. To do this, they compiled bilingual vocabularies, bilingual grammatical exercises, interlineal translations, etc.”2 Nowadays, our linguistic knowledge even allows us to make use of machines to translate from one language to another. Although machine translation is still in its infancy, the time will come when it will replace human translation. Furthermore, the very fact that we can even convey signs to electronic devices is a reflection of the tremendous power signs have. (Explaining the source of this power is one of the themes at the very heart of this book.) Careful observation shows us that sign development follows the same path in all sciences and professional applications. This route can be said to be successful for all of them. Thus, we can once again ask: if sign-systems that are developed for specific fields of endeavor tend to develop successfully, why should we bother to create a general theory of semiotics that unites all of the systems of branch semiotics under one roof? To this question, I would answer that a unified theory is necessary because the science of semiotics itself cannot develop normally when it is divided into multiple and often incompatible domains. As with any other science, semiotics must acquire its own particular paradigm; until it does so, it will remain as it is today: it will stay in a preparadigmatic state. This point is both crucial to my thesis and, as we shall see in the next section, vastly disputable.

2

Cyrus H. Gordon, Forgotten Scripts: The Story of Their Decipherment (London: Thames & Hudson, 1969), p. 72.

18

Chapter Two

Proponents and opponents of a general theory A number of people have disagreed with my thesis on the need for a general theory of semiotics. Their objections vary. I will summarize the main ones below. One type of objection may be called nihilistic; it is a sort of knee-jerk negative reaction to changing something that is already well-established. Critics who hold this view say we should “leave well enough alone.” “Why should we try to construct something new,” they say, “if everything is fine as it is? We semioticians examine and discuss semiotic topics from a vast number of fields. Nobody can claim that we are not dealing with semiotic matters. We write papers on diverse signs and sign-systems, report on them at various meetings, and everybody is content and happy. It is not important that my colleagues at the meetings do not understand anything I say because they are not well-versed in the professional cant I use. Even if this means that my colleagues cannot judge the value of what I say, it is still not important. The only thing that matters is that I discuss or present a semiotic issue”. I once attended a presentation at Imatra (a well-known seminar on semiotics that took place in Finland) about the problems psychiatrists face in treating certain mental illnesses by means of verbal methods. Two Russian psychiatrists spoke about these issues, because they had previously reported on them in a different professional forum and were not satisfied with the responses they received from their colleagues there. They rightly considered the problem to be semiotic in nature, since they were using words to treat the illness, and therefore felt that semioticians would be the best people to decide about how to handle the problems that had arisen. Naturally, none of the semioticians at the presentation understood the issues, but they all nonetheless sat in the room nodding, as if everything was all right. This type of situation is the rule rather than the exception at gatherings of semioticians. Our international

Why We Need General Semiotics

19

meetings remind me of the biblical Tower of Babel after the Almighty scrambled the language spoken by the builders, so that they began speaking in different languages. The builders in that story could not understand one another and were forced to abandon their project. At our forums, we speak mostly in English, and we seem to understand one another, but in actuality, we frequently cannot grasp the ideas expressed by the speakers because we do not know the technical language they use and therefore cannot truly comprehend what they say. Furthermore, even when we do understand their explanations, we still lack the practical experience in their fields that is necessary in order to evaluate their research properly. This, for example, was the case when the psychiatrists presented their work at Imatra. This nihilistic approach is supported by Eugene Gorny, a semiotician from Tartu University (in Estonia). In his wellknown article, “What Is Semiotics,” Gorny says, “When people find out that I am a specialist in semiotics and that I even give lectures in this subject at the university, they always say, “tell me, what is semiotics?” In the course of time, it became clear to me that this is the normal reaction of normal people to the word semiotics itself. Nobody knows what semiotics is and what it deals with...” He then gives his definition of semiotics: “Semiotics is that which is called semiotics by the people who call themselves semioticians.”3 This definition is absurd, but, at any rate, the author is honest in his endeavor to pose the right question and then answer it. A second objection to general semiotics comes from people who simply do not think that it is feasible. One of the most prominent semioticians of our time, Kristian Bankov, of the New Bulgarian University, once told me: “You know what? I 3

Eugene Gorny, “What Is Semiotics,” http://www.netslova.ru/gorny/selected/semiotics_e.htm (1994); accessed June 2013.

20

Chapter Two

do not believe that it is possible to create existential semiotics.” (Bankov, like many other semioticians, used the term “existential semiotics” to mean what I call “general semiotics.” I prefer the term “general” because it is the opposite of “particular,” and thus it highlights the difference between my type of semiotics and what I call branch semiotics.) A lot of people share his skepticism; they do not think that anything valuable can be built from the enterprise I am promoting. Last, but not least, is the widely held view that the creation of general semiotics will be detrimental to the development of branch semiotics – that it will curb the free and independent expansion of the semiotic systems used in individual fields. In the course of my discussions with colleagues, I often heard opinions like this: “Right now, we are at liberty to create the semiotic systems we need in our field as we see fit. You want to restrict us by introducing rigid rules that we must follow.” I want to stress that this concern is entirely unfounded. Just as a general overview of chemistry does not restrict chemists, and a general introduction to medicine does not impinge on advanced medical research, general semiotics does not restrict the creators of branch semiotics in any way. On the contrary, it helps future specialists in particular fields prepare for the work they are going to do. I do not mean to say that all of today’s semioticians oppose my thesis. Many, in fact, have put forth opinions that coincide with my views, at least to some extent. Consider, for example, the opinions of the American semiotician Dr. Charls Pearson, of Austell, Georgia. Although he is now retired, he recently organized a group of theoreticians at the International Association of Semiotic Studies. Throughout his life, he has propagated the idea that the current field of semiotics has not yet passed its pre-paradigmatic phase of development, and called upon semioticians to create a paradigm – in the sense in which the term was used by Thomas Kuhn – for semiotics. Although

Why We Need General Semiotics

21

the paradigm Pearson suggests is quite different from mine, I completely agree with his conviction that today’s semiotics must take this step. Some other people involved with semiotics have not suggested a new approach to semiotics, but have critically appraised the existing state of semiotics. One example of this is Scott Simpkins, of the Cyber Semiotic Institute at the University of Toronto. In his first lecture for the course “Critical Semiotics,” he writes: “‘Semiotics’ could be said to exist only as a topic of discussion. Although it is commonly referred to as though it were a concretely established discipline (or even a “science”), the legerdemain behind this practice cannot be exaggerated.”4

My view of the issue My view of the problem we are discussing is simple: it is useless for us to quarrel, because the core of the paradigm of general semiotics has already been created and is accepted by all active semioticians. This does not mean that a complete, clear-cut paradigm is in use. On the contrary, although certain fundamental postulates are accepted by most semioticians, they are not sufficient to serve as a basis for an allencompassing and operative paradigm. The problem is that each of these groundbreaking postulates is not appropriate in its original form for inclusion in a unified whole. They need to be reformulated before they can be fused together to serve as a complete paradigm for the rising science of general semiotics. Nonetheless, they do actually exist and are used by all active semioticians in all branch semiotics. If they did not, the very notion of semiotics would not have suggested itself to us, 4

Scott Simpkins, “Lecture One: The Lingua Franca of Semioticians,” http://projects.chass.utoronto.ca/semiotics/cyber/sim1.html (1996); accessed June 2013.

22

Chapter Two

and we would never have made any attempt to work in the field of semiotics. My statement that semiotics remains in a pre-paradigmatic state does not mean that it is absolutely devoid of basic principles; it only means that these principles should be modernized and presented as parts of a complete and practical whole. What principles do I have in mind? I will describe four of them now. The first and foremost are Charles Peirce’s theory of what a sign is, and his system of sign classification. Peirce defined the concept of a sign by saying, “a “sign” is something that means (or “stands for”) something to someone.” What is very important in this definition is his assertion that a sign has two points of reference: it is linked, on the one hand, to the thing or event it designates, and, on the other hand, to the minds of the people who decipher it and understand both the notion of the sign and of its referent. Peirce also classified all signs into three categories: indices, images, and symbols. This classification is considered canonical, and is used by semioticians to this day. The second pillar of our domain is Charles Morris. He introduced the methods we employ to analyze the actual functioning of signs. Morris differentiated between three methods of analyzing the functioning of signs. The first, which he called semantic, scrutinizes how signs are used to represent different kinds of referents. The second method, syntactic analysis, looks at the relations among signs in the course of semiosis (i.e., when they are being used). Finally, Morris’s third approach to examining signs, pragmatic analysis, studies the relations between signs and the people who interpret them. Morris’s delineation of the methods of sign analysis are what made semiotic research possible, and he is justly revered for his contributions. The third innovation that paved the way to pure semiotic research was that of Gottlob Frege. Frege distinguished be-

Why We Need General Semiotics

23

tween the meaning of a sign (what is accepted as its intent) and its sense (what it really means in concrete circumstances). The distinction reminds me of the relationship between mass and weight in physics; while mass is a fixed property of an object (like its meaning), its weight is a function both of its mass and of the strength of the gravitational field in which it is currently found (i.e., it is specific to concrete circumstances). This insight gave rise to a huge amount of research studies in the field of semiotics. The fourth breakthrough came from Juri Lotman. (He is the only one of the four groundbreaking thinkers I am discussing here who was my contemporary.) Lotman opened the fields of culture, history, and other aspects of the humanities to semiotic analysis by declaring the events they are concerned with to be signs. Before Lotman did this, signs were only employed for the designation of material objects. Lotman managed to widen the realm of signs and their uses, although his approach relates to semiotics of a different kind from what is usually meant by the term. (I will examine this distinction in more depth in chapter 5.) The theories mentioned above comprise the basis for today’s semiotic studies. They are adequate for a very primitive kind of semiotics, one that remains within bounds that were formulated, to a great extent, a long time ago. Still, within those limits, they do work. Later in this book, I will return to these theories in an attempt to harness them together into a single scientific paradigm, because only by delineating a bold, but logical, paradigm of a science, can one make it internally coherent and mature.

CHAPTER THREE WHAT IS A PARADIGM OF A MATURE SCIENCE?

In 1962, a book called The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, by Thomas Kuhn, was published.1 The author was a physicist by profession, but specialized in the history of science. The book is currently described in Wikipedia in this way: Its publication was a landmark event in the history, philosophy, and sociology of scientific knowledge and triggered an ongoing worldwide assessment and reaction in – and beyond – those scholarly communities. Kuhn challenged the then prevailing view of progress in “normal science.” Scientific progress had been seen primarily as “development-by-accumulation” of accepted facts and theories. Kuhn argued for an episodic model in which periods of such conceptual continuity in normal science were interrupted by periods of revolutionary science. During revolutions in science the discovery of anomalies leads to a new paradigm that changes the rules of the game and the “map” directing new research, asks new questions of old data, and moves beyond the puzzle-solving of normal science.2

1

Thomas Kuhn, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1962). A 50th-anniversary edition was published by the University of Chicago Press in 2012. 2 “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Structure_of_Scientific_Revolutio ns; accessed June 2013.

What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science?

25

The central concept of the book was that of a scientific paradigm. Kuhn wrote that each mature branch of science is organized around a generally accepted set of postulates that constitute the very essence of the science. He did not deny that scientific achievements can take place before the construction of a genuine paradigm, but the existence of a paradigm is, for him, the mark of a mature and stable science. Conversely, during scientific revolutions, old paradigms are ousted by new ones. As an example of a paradigm change of this sort, Kuhn cites the transition from Ptolemy’s model of the structure of our world to Copernicus’ model. The transition took time, but it brought the science of cosmology to a completely new state and established a new set of concepts about the nature of the universe. Although Thomas Kuhn was widely acclaimed for his theory, he was also criticized for reaching some exaggerated conclusions. Critics pointed out that scientific revolutions do not always result in complete changes. Rather, they said, most scientific revolutions build upon facts that were previously known, and are essentially continuations from the earlier sciences with accretions of new facts. In most cases, the original facts are included in the new paradigm. Nonetheless, Kuhn’s notion of paradigm was generally welcomed. Over time, it has become a fixture in debates among specialists in particular disciplines. A strong and wellestablished paradigm has come to be seen as epitomizing solid, reliable scientific fields and established scientific theories. In presenting my views on modern semiotics, I have also relied on this notion. I posit that today’s semiotics is in a preparadigmatic phase; in order for it to reach maturity, it must synthesize a compelling paradigm that will force all semioticians to evaluate the phenomena they study from a single,

Chapter Three

26

well-defined point of view. As I pointed out in the previous chapter, Charls Pearson shares this conviction with me.3 In his book, Kuhn advanced 22 different definitions of the notion of scientific paradigm, but he never detailed the elements from which it must be composed. Thus, even after his book was published and Kuhn’s ideas came to be wellaccepted, the problem remained unresolved. When I decided to construct a discipline of general semiotics, this was one of the first problems I considered. As with all the other parts of my theory, I mulled over this issue a great deal, and contemplated a range of possible alternative solutions. Every time I dealt with the problem, I arrived at a slightly different result, until I recently formulated what I think will be the final version. The diagram below presents this formulation:

Paradigm of a Mature Science

Means of verification

Philosophical underpinnings

Metalanguages Conceptual grid and terminology Taxonomies and classifications

Figure 3-1

3

See page 20.

Formal axiomatics (if possible)

What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science?

27

In the diagram, the parts of the paradigm do not appear in any particular order or in accordance with their relative values as part of the whole. The parts may develop sequentially or in parallel – how they develop depends on many conditions. The only thing I want to underline now is that the philosophical underpinnings of the paradigm must precede the rest of its development. That is why I put an arrow alongside this element in the diagram – to show that the other parts of the paradigm must follow this part.

The philosophical underpinnings of a theory Every science commences with unrestricted discussions on the things people see around them, in the ontological and semiotic realities in which they live. People watch their environments and try to explain what they observe. In the course of human history, such deliberations typically went through three stages: mythological, religious, and scientific (in that order). Initially, the ancients explained the things they observed as the results of external forces that governed the development and transformation of events. Every type of occurrence was said to obey its own supernatural master. Over time, this notion was superseded by a new idea, monotheism, in which the manifold deities of mythology were replaced with a single, almighty God. During the monotheistic era, this God was viewed as the master of everything, and was said to plan the entire course of events in advance. Little by little, people have come over to scientific thinking and begun looking for imminent reasons for the behavior of inanimate and animate objects, and for laws that govern these behaviors. For this purpose, they had to identify analogous phenomena, and group and classify them. In order to do this, they carefully observed the subjects they chose to study, drew conclusions about them and their qualities by inference. Finally, they expressed their conclusions using signs and sign-systems – for

28

Chapter Three

there is no other way to define and convey human thoughts besides signs. Today, we can see signs from all three of these stages in the creeds that are in vogue among the various members of the human population: totems and other images satisfy the superstitious beliefs of people in the mythological stage of knowledge acquisition; rituals and symbols of various widely accepted religions are found among the adherents of different faiths; and a huge number of different signs and sign-systems belong to the scientific era. Much can be said about each of these three strata of signs. We will have occasion to deal with all of them in this book, but, naturally, we will concentrate mostly on those signs that are of scientific origin. The investigation of scientific signs has two facets. On the one hand, we must look at the philosophical ideas that lead us to conclude that general semiotics must be developed in its own right. (I have presented my arguments in favor of this in the previous chapter and in the current chapter.) On the other hand, we must look at the ways in which this philosophical foundation can be expressed in our handling of various semiotic issues. At this point, I must make a purely philosophical digression. It is important to understand that I relate to the role of philosophy differently from conventional philosophers. They generally define philosophy as something that deals with the most important issues of human existence: the place of humans in the universe, their roles, the justifications for proper behavior and values, etc. To be sure, they are right; these are the prevailing themes in philosophical works. But I view philosophy as something that provides us with a general approach to any problem, great or small, that we want to solve. In this context, the first things we have to do when we approach a problem are to define the general character of the problem and to outline what we have to do, and what tools we

What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science?

29

should employ, in order to arrive at a solution as quickly and efficiently as possible. Consider, for example, the trivial problem of how to reach a particular destination in an unfamiliar region. Before we begin to actually solve this problem – to go to the destination – we must identify the shortest route to the destination and various landmarks that will help us orient ourselves as we go. To do this, we may consult a map of the area, ask people for directions, or use a GPS guidance system. Only after we perform these preliminary tasks, and draw the necessary conclusions from them, can we begin to take practical steps by physically moving towards the destination. It is the preliminary process that I call philosophical. The same process occurs when we deal with much more important issues, such as scientific investigations and the evaluation of moral obligations. Thus, from my point of view, philosophy is the initial, unrestricted approach to any problem we are trying to solve. Only after this initial approach has been completed, do we enter into territory that is restricted by definite rules, rules whose sources are rooted in the concrete sciences we are in the process of utilizing. In sum, we can say that philosophy is involved with science not only as a general framework for defining the realm of each science, but also as a system that affects every nook and cranny of scientific development within each field. Thus, for the science of general semiotics, we must employ philosophy in order to formulate its taxonomy; characterize its main concepts, such as a sign or a sign-system; and give it a firm foundation in many other ways. Each problem that we discuss will require philosophical deliberation; only after we have completed this preliminary inquiry will we be able to discuss how we can use its conclusions to help us structure general semiotics most effectively.

30

Chapter Three

Formal axiomatization of a theory After the philosophical foundations of a scientific branch are formulated, scholars may turn to delineating the boundaries of the subject matter it includes. For this, they axiomatize the branch; that is, they construct a set of axioms to serve as its foundations. Although the concept of formal axiomatization is the product of recent times, scientists have de facto used axiomatization in their work, without formalizing it, from the very beginnings of scientific activity. Formal axiomatization was first articulated at the threshold of the 20th century in the works of David Hilbert on the axiomatization of geometry. Hilbert’s system was based on three entities, three interrelationships, and 20 axioms. The three entities he introduced were a point, a straight line, and a plane, and he connected them together by defining three interrelations among them. He then formulated 20 axioms about these six primitive notions. One could infer all the theorems of geometry from these six propositions and 20 axioms.4 Like Hilbert, I am proposing a tripartite axiomatic system for general semiotics, by defining it as a science that deals with signs, sign-systems, and semiotic reality. These three notions, or rather concepts, are connected hierarchically. (The difference between “notions” and “concepts” is elaborated upon later in this chapter.) First we invent signs; then we collect signs into sign-systems in accordance with the signsystems’ fundamental rules; and, finally, all of the signsystems that have empirically proven their usefulness are included in the collection of human knowledge that I call semiotic reality. Humanity, in its encounters with ontological reality, does not only solve problems directly, but also by refer4

“Hilbert’s Axioms,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilbert%27s_axioms (2014); accessed March 2015.

What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science?

31

ring to the wealth of relevant semiotic data that has been amassed over time. Defining semiotics in this way means that semiotics should conjoin the three spheres – signs, their systems, and semiotic reality – to create a single whole. This, then, is how I delineate the scope of the science I want to create. But, although I believe this is a good start, I have not yet succeeded in fully deciphering the problems of formal axiomatization; that process is only just beginning. My tripartite construction needs to be extended further. There are different types of signs and sign-systems, and they need to be handled individually. So, too, semiotic reality, which is essentially a new concept, has many aspects, and I have only barely touched upon them by giving it a name and attributing some rather vague characteristics and a haphazard set of attributes to it. In this book, I deal with many problems related to the three parts of semiotics, but there are far more issues about which I do not have any knowledge at all. This approach to semiotics is only beginning to be investigated in detail.

Semiotic taxonomy and classifications In the history of semiotics, two prominent classification systems for signs have been proposed. The first was set forth by St. Augustine (354–430), who divided signs into two broad categories: signs that were borrowed from nature and signs that were invented by men. The second, which serves as the foundation of modern semiotics, was presented in the works of Charles Peirce (1839–1914). This latter system gave us a tripartite division of signs into indices, images, and symbols. Most semioticians use this classification today, although there are some researchers who feel it is insufficient. I have taken the initiative and invented my own classification system. (I call my system a “taxonomy,” for reasons that will be explained later in this section.) My system relies on

32

Chapter Three

two criteria: the type of sign-system and its kind of basic sign. Unlike the other classification systems, I do not classify signs and sign-systems separately; instead, I combine them together. I do this because all previous endeavors to develop separate classifications have failed. Indeed, even Peirce tried to construct a more detailed classification than the one mentioned above, but he too failed. In my taxonomy, each type of sign-system is based on the kind of basic signs used in it. That is, all sign-systems that use the same kind of basic sign belong to the same type of signsystem. For example, one type of sign-system I have identified is what I call a natural sign-system. Natural sign-systems utilize signs that are taken from nature as their basic signs (as in St. Augustine’s scheme, which I mentioned above); I call these kinds of signs natural signs. People often use natural signs (sunrays, stars, bark on tree stumps, etc.) to orient themselves in their surroundings, and doctors use the natural signs they see in and on our bodies (i.e., our symptoms) to define and diagnose our illnesses. In fact, thousands of natural signsystems exist. To better understand this idea, contrast natural sign-systems with another type of sign-system I have identified: the iconic sign-system. Iconic sign-systems all employ icons or images as their basic signs. And, just as there are numerous natural sign-systems, there are also numerous iconic sign-systems. By following this logic, I have constructed a hierarchical taxonomy of signs and their sign-systems. It consists of six different kinds of basic signs (in this case, they are actually taxons) that give rise to six distinct types of sign-systems. The six types are built one upon the other in the order in which they appear below. Each type affects the development and maturation of the types that precede and follow it in the list. 1. Natural signs are the basis of natural sign-systems. 2. Images underlie iconic sign-systems.

What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science?

33

3. Words are the building blocks of language signsystems. 4. Graphemes are the building blocks of notational signsystems. 5. Symbols with constant meanings constitute the basis for formalized codes of the first order. 6. Symbols with changeable meanings constitute the basis for formalized codes of the second order. (For example, in algebra or mathematical logic, most of the basic signs are variables.) As we go down the list, the signs in each category can be said to gradually become more “distant” from the things they signify: Natural signs are visible (or audible) elements of a complete picture. They are objects that allow us to conjure up a totality that would otherwise escape our senses. Examples of natural signs are a visible column of smoke that attests to the existence of a fire that is not within our visual range, and a light coming from a window, which suggests that the inhabitant of the room is at home. Both the smoke and the light are things in themselves but they are also signs that represent other things. Images, unlike natural signs, are not physically part of an extant thing that they represent. Instead, they reflect what they represent in the form of images that resemble it. Clearly, images are more removed from their referents than natural signs, which are themselves parts of the phenomena they designate. On the other hand, the resemblance factor brings images close to what they signify, so they are not very distant from them. Words are generally arbitrary signs that have no intrinsic resemblance to what they signify. Yet, words do have an extra-systemic relationship to the things they represent: “a table” is always “a table,” regardless of what it actually is in the real world. That is, a word is always used to represent the same

34

Chapter Three

thing. The word “table” is not used to represent a table one day and a refrigerator another day. Graphemes only have relationships with particular signsystems, and their sign-systems are their only reality. Their purpose is to indicate something within the sign-system by presenting it in graphic form. Nevertheless, the ties between graphemes and their referents are constant. For example, individual letters continually represent the sounds assigned to them by the particular language in which they exist. Just as “a table” is always a table in the extra-systemic reality, its written form will always be “t-a-b-l-e” in the relevant language, because the letters always represent the same sounds. Symbols (the two highest levels in the taxonomy of signs) are arbitrary notations for dealing with ad hoc situations. For example, “w” may mean “weight” in one situation and “width” in another. Thus, symbols are signs that have the remotest possible connection to their referents. They are the most abstract of the basic signs. Those symbols that are always attached to the same meaning (like “I” in electricity) belong to the first taxon of symbols (#5 on page 33 above) of sign-systems. Symbols that are variables whose meaning is not fixed belong to the second, most abstract taxon of signsystems (#6 above). As I mentioned above, when the taxons of signs are arranged in the order I used, the signs gradually become more distant from their referents. Another way of saying this is that the degrees of abstraction rise from one type of basic sign to the next. This progression corresponds to the gradual process by which human knowledge grows, both within each individual person (in ontogenesis) and in humankind as a whole (phylogenesis). That is, the order in which I listed the types of signs and sign-systems matches both the normal progression of individuals’ intellectual development and the development of human knowledge over time. Both kinds of development

What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science?

35

begin from the lowest level, and, as each successive level appears, it influences the levels below it and is also influenced in return by feedback from those lower levels. This is a new approach to the problem of sign classification, one that goes far beyond Peirce’s tripartite one. It is not surprising that, of all my innovations in the field of semiotics, this one has elicited the most enthusiasm and approval. I will discuss this taxonomy and some other classifications in chapter 9, but it is worthwhile at this point to mention one difference between taxonomies and classifications. Once we have defined the philosophical foundations of a science, and have defined and delimited the scope of the science, we have to sort its components into groups so that we can study each group separately. This is true in every branch of science. In fact, it is a process that takes place continuously as the branch develops, so that the groupings are constantly redefined and rearranged. When we first begin defining the groups, the kind of groups we create are taxons. For example, one of the earliest scientific classifications was composed in ancient Greece, when Theophrastus (371-286 BC), who was called the father of botany and ecology, divided all plants into four groups: trees, shrubs, grasses, and flowers. There is nothing unscientific in such a division, but it is essentially a taxonomy. Each group came to include such a variety of types of objects, that they could not all be studied in the same manner. The ultimate goal of classification is to arrive at unified and homogeneous groups, so that all of the objects included in a single group can be handled in the same way. Preliminary groupings are so far from this goal that I consider them taxonomies, rather than true classifications. Later classifications, which are based on a deeper understanding of the subject matter, are what I call “real” classifications. Over time, we achieve better and better categorization of the objects we study. The formal indication of a proper classification is the existence of a special criterion

36

Chapter Three

separating each group from others in the same taxonomic layer. Therefore, my “classification” of semiotic objects is, to my mind, only a taxonomy, and not a classification proper.

Conceptual grid and terminology Hand in hand with the ongoing research that is underway within a scientific branch goes the process of choosing appropriate terminology for all of its notions and concepts. This process is very important, because in the long run, it both shapes the way the issues that arise as the field develops are discussed, and determines how the branch is viewed by people who are not involved in it. The terminology of general semiotics is a case in point. I have been working on this terminology for more than 20 years, all the while extending and enriching it, so that it gradually became more and more consistent. I have written more about this terminology in supplement 3; for now, suffice it to say that today it comprises more than 140 terms that are relevant to what I consider to be semiotics. All of these terms define purely semiotic matters and clearly distinguish them from issues that belong to other branches of science. The terminology of any science consists of two layers: 1. Standard terms that define the characteristics of objects in the science, their qualities, and the processes that involve them 2. What I call the chief concepts of the science The second layer, the chief concepts, is very important, and it embodies one of my most significant innovations. The chief-concepts layer contains the backbone of the scientific branch; it is a kind of filter that distinguishes it from all of the other sciences. I call this layer the conceptual grid of a scientific branch. I will discuss this concept in detail later in this

What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science?

37

book.5 For now, to get a sense of what a conceptual grid is, imagine a collection of vocabulary lists of terms related to a particular field of study. Each list contains the vocabulary for one of the main concepts of the field, and that concept is the title of the list. There is one list for each significant concept in the field. Within each list, the words are arranged in alphabetical order. The set of all of the titles of all of the lists is the conceptual grid of the science.

Metalanguages in science Every sign-system, large or small, must have its own metalanguage. The metalanguage contains information about what the system is used for, how it is built, and the rules for working with it. A metalanguage of a few lines is sufficient for simple, straightforward systems like, for example, the signsystem employed by traffic lights. This sign-system enumerates the three lights the system utilizes, their order of appearance, and the appropriate reactions to these signs. The system is so simple that it can be taught to small children, and it is widely disseminated among them. By contrast, many other sign-systems are very large and complicated. For example, natural languages are sign-systems that are so large and complex that it takes years of intensive learning, followed by a lifetime of continuing education, to master their metalanguages. Metalanguages usually contain an enumeration of the signs included in the system (for languages, this is done through general dictionaries) and the rules for processing them (for languages, this is embodied in manuals of grammar, phonetics, style, etc.). In fact, massive and complicated sign-systems typically have many metalanguages, because each of their 5

See “The conceptual grid and its philosophical meaning,” page 333.

38

Chapter Three

subsystems has its own metalanguages. Thus, linguistics has a general metalanguage, which explains what language as a human institution is and how it functions, but it also has secondary linguistic systems, like lexical and grammatical systems, that have subordinate metalanguages. Each of these secondary metalanguages begins with the enumeration of its basic signs (in grammar they are morphemes, in phonetics – phonemes, etc), followed by detailed explanations and rules for using them.

Means of verifying sign processing Each type of sign-system has its own mechanisms for verifying the processing of its components. As you will see, the methods depend greatly on the degree to which the signs that compose the system are abstract. The more abstract the signs are, the more distant they are from their referents, and, therefore, the more they must lean on the sign-system to which they belong for support. This is, in fact, one of the first principles I formulated in my theory of semiotics. And the converse of this law is also true: complex, internal verification procedures indicate that a sign-system contains relatively abstract signs. Whereas the less abstract sign-systems function perfectly well with immediate, out-of-system verification, highly abstract systems of signs are obliged to invent their own verification procedures. In addition, the length of time required for verification also varies depending on the degree of abstraction, from immediate to very prolonged periods. Let us examine this argument by means of my taxonomy table – the method I often use in my own contemplation of semiotic issues. In natural systems, we must verify our progress at every step along the way by checking all possible external sources of information. And the more often we do so, the better. If sailors are searching for the correct direction for their ship to sail, and they do not have any mechanical or electronic tools

What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science?

39

to guide them, they apply all possible means to verify their route as often as possible – using clouds, stars, birds, ocean currents, etc. If they find out that they are off-track, they immediately change their course. They follow these clues, because natural signs are parts of the picture, and choosing the wrong signs leads to entanglements and complicates the whole situation. In iconic systems, the proximity of images to their referents is not quite so critical; the images are but reflections of the signified and not a part of it. Consulting the signified from time to time, as the need arises, suffices. Thus, an artist painting a portrait looks at the person he is depicting, and then at the gradually developing likeness of the person, moving his gaze back and forth as he works. Sometimes, he even paints from memory, although that is not his normal mode of operation. When we use language sign-systems, the need for verification decreases even more. We need not be so exact when we are dealing with words – not nearly as precise as we must be when we are working with an image that has to retain a physical likeness to its referent. Thus, we have many synonymic words at our disposal describing one and the same issue. The situation changes significantly when we use formalized systems like mathematics. In these systems, the symbols that are used are so far from their signified that we can put off the verification of the sign manipulations for very long periods of time. In some cases, the opportunity to verify a conclusion only arises on special occasions that were not even foreseen when the sign processing took place. Thus, the verification of Einstein’s general theory of relativity was delayed until the solar eclipse of 1919, when it became possible to verify it and, based on the results of the verification process, to either accept or reject the theory itself. In 1911, Einstein had calculated, based on his new theory of

40

Chapter Three

general relativity, that light from another star would be bent by the sun’s gravity. That prediction was confirmed by observations made by a British expedition led by Sir Arthur Eddington during the solar eclipse of May 29, 1919. Likewise, Mendeleev’s table of chemical elements included some elements that were not known at the time the table was invented, but were anticipated based on their structural traits. The existence of these elements was only confirmed when they were actually discovered, more than 15 years after Mendeleev publicized his innovation. Because of the inconvenience involved in waiting for years to verify the results of a sign manipulation, some sign-systems with very high degrees of abstraction provide their users with an intra-systemic means of verification. Thus, in arithmetic we can verify the result of an addition problem by using the opposite action, subtraction (and vice versa), and we can verify the result of a multiplication problem using division. In symbolic logic, special verification tables were introduced; these tables made it possible to check, whether our formal manipulations of symbols were correct. By consulting logic tables, we can reach conclusions about whether our actions were right or wrong. But, bear in mind that these verdicts have nothing to do with the actual ontological qualities of rightness or wrongness; they merely approve or discount our purely formal actions within the system of symbolic logic. Another method of verification in highly abstract systems is the incorporation of innovations into the fiber of existing theories. This relates to the improvement of semiotic tools rather than investigations into ontological issues. These innovations do not require external confirmation in ontology; it is enough for them to be compatible with already active semiotic theories and to have a positive impact on those theories. Thus, the introduction of punctuation into written texts not only met

What is a Paradigm of a Mature Science?

41

out-of-system needs, but also served the intrinsic needs of readers by helping them orient themselves on the page. This brings my short excursion into the field of semiotic verification to a close. Its purpose was not only to describe the verification phenomenon in sign-systems, but also to demonstrate that my approach to purely semiotic matters actually works in practice. We shall demonstrate this again and again in the upcoming pages of this book. This completes the introductory chapters of this book. In the next chapters, we will undertake systematic consideration of concrete semiotic issues. Naturally, we will begin with the philosophical underpinnings of the science of signs and their systems – that is, of general semiotics.

CHAPTER FOUR PHILOSOPHICAL UNDERPINNINGS OF GENERAL SEMIOTICS

This chapter contains a collection of philosophical assertions that are intended to ultimately provide a basis on which a concrete and logically coherent structure can be built. I would like to underline that this chapter is not constructed as an orderly series of postulates, based one upon the other in a logical progression. In fact, these postulates can easily be contradicted and replaced with other arguments. They are actually quite arbitrary, but, as I mentioned earlier, they are necessary for the construction of a theory of general semiotics. They are necessary because without them we would not be able to choose the most convincing axiomatic assumptions for the science we are building. By their very nature, axioms are always arbitrary, but we nonetheless try to use them to create a foundation that is as devoid of contradictions as possible. Only after this has been done, does the collection become a formal axiomatic, which enables us to extract correct and reliable practical implications from it.

What is a sign and who benefits from it? It gives me great pleasure to turn once more to Peirce’s definition of a sign – his definition is the cornerstone of all the deliberations that follow – to answer these basic questions about signs. Peirce wrote that “A sign... [in the form of a representamen] is something which stands to somebody for

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

43

something in some respect or capacity.” This means that the sign interpreter and user must understand its double nature – on the one hand, it is something material, with its own meaning, but on the other hand, it represents something else. Without an understanding of this duality, we cannot use signs at all. Consider, for example, a situation in which I have arranged to meet a friend at a particular time under the clock at the railway station. When I am waiting there for my friend, the clock, in addition to being a timepiece, has become a sign representing a meeting place, but only for me and my friend. Scores of passers-by, glancing at the clock as I stand there, do not suspect the existence of this sign. For them, the clock is simply a material object showing the time. This means that any material object, and its qualities and characteristics, can become a sign for the people who are involved in using it as a sign and are aware of its twofold nature. Moreover, even the absence of something may take on the qualities of a sign. Thus, for example, two secret-service operatives may arrange to meet, but only if a vase of flowers is not on the windowsill of the house in which they plan to have their meeting. If the vase is there, that is also a sign, but with the opposite meaning: “It is too dangerous, you must not come in.” This is true not only of natural signs, which are relatively concrete, but also of very abstract signs. Consider, for example, the decimal system, in which zero means the absence of any value. It took many centuries for the sign of zero to be invented; for centuries before it was invented, people just left a blank space to represent the idea of zero. Understanding the double meanings of signs requires a human mind, and only a human mind can do it. Neither inanimate objects, nor plants or animals, can conceive of signs in their entirety. This point is worth considering in greater detail, because a lot of semioticians are of a different opinion. The entire field of biosemiotics is based on the proposition that

44

Chapter Four

signs govern the behavior of all biological processes, that they are responsible for the normal development of all living creatures and even of the processes that take place in our bodies without our conscious awareness. This assumption is the source of all the manifold inferences of biosemiotics. Let us examine this issue in greater depth. There is no doubt that inanimate objects do not respond to any signs, but plants and animals behave as if they do understand signs, and they respond to them both positively and negatively. Nonetheless, although they clearly do respond to various external inputs, their responses belong only to the realm of “stimulus–response” reactions. Their reactions are mostly automatic; they are preprogrammed by inheritance to respond to certain phenomena in particular ways, and do not have any understanding of the inner essence of a sign, namely, its representing something other than itself. For plants and animals, a sign is simply a stimulus from outside themselves for which they either do or do not possess an answer. Those that do not respond appropriately usually perish; those that do respond properly tend to remain intact. This is what makes us think that plants and animals understand external signs. The diversity of responses they exhibit depends not on their individual understanding of signs as representations of other things. They depend on the history of their particular species and its effect on how they accommodate to their environments. Plants are mostly motionless. They are restricted in their relations with their surroundings because they can only interact with things that come into their immediate vicinities. As a result, they receive a very small number of stimuli. They accommodate themselves to normal, common phenomena, and this is their modus vivendi. Insects, birds, and animals are capable of moving from place to place. This greatly diversifies the number of new impressions that come their way, and their

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

45

dependence on signs is greater than that of plants. Yet none of them ever reaches the stage in which signs begin to permeate their lives completely, and are required for survival, as they are in humans. Our physiological and mental capacities appear to be so capable of adaptation to different circumstances, that we do not only take ready-made natural things and turn them into signs by accommodating our behavior to them; we also invent previously non-existent denotations, whose meanings we agree upon by convention, to enable us to penetrate to the essences of all events and circumstances. This capacity is beyond the abilities of all other living creatures besides humans. All other organisms, even the highly developed apes, which are genetically the closest to us, cannot approach humans in this respect. To be sure, they can grasp the meanings of a number of stimuli and understand what they signify, but this is a very limited and narrow ability that clearly belongs to the automatic stimulus-response reactions that are programmed by their genes. These are more signals than signs. All the talk about the capacity of animals to comprehend signs reminds me of the frequent, enthusiastic reports in the media about discoveries that apes can speak and understand speech. For more than a century, animal psychologists tried to teach apes to pronounce words understandably, but their lengthy efforts, over many years, were futile. A few incomprehensible sounds, with a hint of understanding on the part of the “learners,” were all they achieved. Nor are any apes known to have initiated new “words” in the course of their many years of “learning”; after much ado, they only repeated very blurred sounds that they were taught to pronounce and to link to a definite meaning. But that is exactly what Pavlov’s dogs could do after a few days of training; and the dogs were trained purely behavioristically, within the framework of stimulus-response reactions.

46

Chapter Four

By contrast, we humans have not only invented a huge number of highly sophisticated signs and sign-systems, we have also made them the main tool we use to propel our constant advancement. Without signs, we cannot learn new things or introduce innovative discoveries into our lives, and it is these innovations that make our lives lengthier and more comfortable. We learn with signs, speak with signs, and move around using the signs in our immediate vicinities to guide us. When I say that the development of signs was accompanied by a gradual increase in their degrees of abstraction, I also mean that those signs had a comparable effect on the human mindset. Not only did signs become more penetrating and powerful, people also become cleverer and more adaptive as a result of these developments. All of this gives us the right to dub the human race “symbolic animals”– a name coined by the German philosopher Ernst Cassirer (1874–1945).

A universe of symbolic meanings The “universe of symbolic meanings,” as Cassirer described it, begins with separate signs. The question arises, whether a separate sign can exist by itself or whether signs appear only in the framework of sign-systems. My answer is this: separate signs can be in use and possess independent status, but only under certain special conditions. The first condition is that a separate sign must be a proper name, that is, it must have only one referent. If a sign signifies many objects at one time, it cannot exist as an autonomous entity. This is because there would be manifold relationships among the objects signified by the sign, and users would have to refer to sign-systems to learn about how to deal with the various possibilities. When a sign is a proper name, it can rely exclusively on the single object it designates. The name of a city, like London or Paris, is clear to people because they are either personally acquainted with the city, have seen travel

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

47

brochures about it, or know about it from some other source. By contrast, when you utter the word “city” (or “cities”), you must take the many classes and subclasses of the objects denoted by the term into consideration, and rely on linguistic and other systems to help you understand what it means. Even this stipulation, that all signs other than proper names must be part of sign-systems, has some exceptions. Take, for example, a standard passport or other document whose purpose is to help establish a person’s identity. The photo in the document must be clear and recent enough to resemble the document’s holder. Only if it does so will the sign – the picture – fulfill its purpose. But, on the other hand, it does not require a sign-system to fulfill that purpose. Similarly, consider a sign that looks like a round shield with a number in it – say “3.5” or “4.0” – on the structure supporting a bridge that crosses a river. This is an isolated sign that resembles the ones we see on roads. In this case, its current surroundings guide us to its meaning – vessels that protrude above the water level by more than the number of meters written on the sign cannot fit under the bridge. This is clear to the viewer without any need for a sign-system to help explain it. Thus, individual signs like the ID photo or the bridge sign, whose meaning is clear simply from the context in which they are found, can be used without belonging to a sign-system, even though they are not proper nouns. Clearly, though, the vast majority of individual signs are collected into the groups we call sign-systems. These groups organize their components into hierarchical and subordinate structures in such a way that they can be used to solve particular problems in the most effective manner possible. To use them, a person must follow the algorithms that are built into the specific sign-system that is designed to deal with the problem at hand. We will discuss this in detail later in this work. For now, suffice it to say that refining various kinds of sign-

48

Chapter Four

systems is a job that is performed by specialists in the particular sciences and practical fields in which they will be used, and that this job is one that takes up a lot of these specialists’ time and effort. In fact, whenever you find experts working to further develop and expand the sign-systems used in their fields of expertise, you can be sure that breakthroughs are under way in those fields. Sign-systems follow the same path of development we observed in signs; over time, sign-systems with greater and greater levels of abstraction have come into existence. Indeed, as I mentioned above, my taxonomy of semiotic entities is relevant not only to signs, but also to their systems: natural sign-systems appeared first, followed by iconic systems, then language systems, and so on, until the most abstract types of sign-systems – mathematical systems and other formal codes – came into being. Historically, the appearance of ever more abstract sign-systems has reflected the gradual maturation of the human mind. In recent times, we have seen the introduction of computer programs. These are the most abstract signsystems introduced as yet in the course of human civilization. Blocks of different sign-systems whose signs have the same level of abstraction constitute semiotic layers that I call types of analogous sign-systems. In my taxonomic model of semiotics, I identified six layers of these types (natural, iconic, etc.). Nonetheless, it is possible that in the future, humans may invent a new layer. For example, a layer may be added for the exchange of information through the reading of other people’s thoughts by touching a special thought transmitter. Inventions of this type will demand sign-systems of greater abstraction than any of the ones currently in existence. The real “universe of symbolic meanings” is what I call semiotic reality. Semiotic reality gathers together all the signs and sign-systems that have been used or proposed throughout the known history of human civilization. I chose the name

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

49

semiotic reality, because it reflects the relationship between the semiotic realm and the ontological reality that gave birth to it. The ontological type of reality is that which we encounter in the world around us. It embraces our surroundings and ourselves; some philosophers call it objective reality. Being part of the natural world, we have to accommodate ourselves to it. To this end, we study the world and try to adjust ourselves to its inherent laws. Then we formulate our conclusions by means of signs, because there is no other way for us to express the products of our minds. It is through this process of studying the world around us and searching for ways to deal with it more effectively, that we produce semiotic reality – through expounding upon our surroundings in writing and creating new material objects. This means that semiotic reality grows out of our strivings to understand ontological reality and to change it to our advantage. Over time, little by little, semiotic reality, which is expressed by physical signs that we grasp through our senses, has become huge and all-embracing, to the extent that getting one’s bearings in this ocean of information is sometimes very difficult. Some people, because of their psychological dispositions, prefer to deal with the ontological type of reality, while others tend to turn more to living within and dealing with semiotic reality. Those in the latter group distance themselves from the real world surrounding them and compose their own imaginary environment. The Argentinean writer, Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986), for example, clearly favored literary surroundings – for him the world was a huge library in which he navigated very well. Still, most people combine both practical occupations and interactions with semiotic reality in their daily lives. I introduced the concept of semiotic reality at the end of the last century and have written a great deal about it in my

Chapter Four

50

publications.1 It is evident to me that studying this kind of reality is a semiotic activity, and I have suggested that studies of this kind be treated as part of semiotic science. The most interesting feature of the semiotic world appears to be this: although the semiotic results of examining ontology are intended to fit the objects of study like a glove to a hand, it very often is not possible to accomplish this, so that this goal is only partially achieved. I like to formulate this idea in this way: signs cannot reflect their referents in full, but only in part; and sign-systems, which are created for specific purposes, do not develop in accordance with the same laws as the ontological phenomena they are designed to study. This concept has many very interesting epistemological implications, which we shall discuss at length in this book.

Main functions of signs, sign-systems, and semiotic reality In this section, I will focus on each of the three main semiotic concepts – signs, sign-systems, and semiotic reality – individually, and discuss their main features and functions. Qualities of signs that affect the development of the human race As I mentioned previously, the main function of a sign is to represent something other than itself. Representation can have a variety of aims: to simply name a thing or a process, to distinguish objects from one another, to characterize objects, etc. We shall speak about this more later in this chapter, as well as in chapters 6-9, which are devoted entirely to signs. For now, I would only like to discuss some general functions of signs that have had a significant impact on the destiny of mankind. 1

See supplement 4.

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

51

One of these functions is forewarning. This, in fact, seems to be the primary function of signs, inasmuch as it is responsible for the survival of homo sapiens as a species. This function is, by the way, common to men and animals. To the extent that we can discern signs being used among animals, they are primarily signs of forewarning. Animals, birds, and probably some insects, have evolved with the ability to use sounds to alert the members of their group about approaching danger. That is, one member of the group produces identifiable signals and the whole group runs away from the anticipated danger. Signs of forewarning are very important for the survival of the species. Creatures that do not employ such signals are liable to perish much more easily than those that do. Humans benefit much more than any other living organisms from the various signs of forewarning. This is because the chief medium we possess for warning about danger is our language; we can use it to announce, explain, and predict danger to our friends and to other people in general. In addition, we also make use of diverse means, such as gestures and devices for the purpose of forewarning. For example, we use instruments to signal others about imminent dangers like fires or earthquakes. Our broad array of sophisticated forewarning signs is one of the reasons we occupy such a prominent position among all living things. Another reason d’être for signs is the need to name each and every thing and process in the world. Not only do we name objects, we also name their qualities and the connections between them. Otherwise, we cannot discuss them if they are not within our reach or in our immediate surroundings. Signs that serve this function are absolutely necessary for the normal development of human beings, and probably also spurred the birth of language.

52

Chapter Four

Languages are the most important sign-systems in this respect, and they really do try to give a special name to everybody and everything. This, though, is an unattainable ideal; no matter how rich and full of synonyms a living natural language is, it is not capable of comprising every name, quality, and action. It is for this reason that, as we speak, we always feel that we lack the required linguistic means of expressing ourselves, and, as a result, we often invent neologisms that are only understandable within the context of the current statement or conversation. Naming every ontological thing and its qualities is also necessary for designating their belonging. This is another function of signs that supports the normal development of human beings. We are very conscious of social status, and underscore it in all our actions. Many signs with special meanings exist for this purpose; that is, signs that indicate that something belongs to someone abound in human societies. One group of signs in this category includes all the signs that are used to define property rights. Examples of signs in this group are the boundary markers erected by landowners along the borders of their lands, marks herders put on the animals in their herds to identify them, names of authors that are attached to their works, and the copyright symbols (©) that these authors insert before their names. Using signs of belonging is instinctive for all of us and many obvious signs are used for this purpose. Another pervasive function of signs is the acquisition of knowledge. Signs are indispensable for acquiring new knowledge, formulating it for ourselves, and disseminating it among other people. We may acquire new knowledge by actions (through observation or otherwise), but when we do so, the actions are always accompanied by relevant signs. These signs are also indispensable to us when we formulate conclusions from our investigations. Initially, we use the signs to

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

53

help us formulate our conclusions to ourselves in the clearest and most complete manner possible. After we have done so, we use signs to communicate our conclusions to other people – using signs and sign-systems that are understood by the audience we are addressing. It is important to say here that each type of sign has a different inherent potential for functionality. This potential is a function of their quanta of abstraction. Simple manipulations of concrete objects, rather than signs representing those objects, can only give us information about those exact objects themselves. If we want more generalized information, we have to turn to signs. Within the realm of signs, the least abstract is a proper name, which simply designates the named object and distinguishes it from all other objects in the world. The name accompanies its referent as long as the referent continues to exist, and in many cases, even after it ceases to exist. We cannot expect to arrive at significant general conclusions from proper names alone. To penetrate into the essence of a matter we are studying, we have to rely on signs that have greater quanta of abstraction and, therefore, more power to reveal the natures of the things they represent. Images, which are slightly more abstract than names, can reveal manifold aspects of the objects they illustrate, from various vantage points. They can add a great deal to our first acquaintance with their referents. Even more information can be provided by language signs – by words that are used to create definitions and identify characteristics. Finally, when we make use of the most abstract sign-systems, formalized systems, we can ignore the objects themselves entirely; by merely manipulating the signs, we can discover properties that are hidden from our senses and identify the most generalized qualities of things. This point is of the utmost importance, and we will come back to

54

Chapter Four

its details and its implementation in various circumstances many times in this book. For the purposes of a philosophical introduction to the functions of signs, we have said enough. Later on, we will return to the issues that were introduced briefly here.

The functions of sign-systems The main function of sign-systems is to gather all the signs that are relevant to a particular viewpoint and set of goals, place them in a single hierarchically organized structure, and provide rules to govern their processing. All of the actions prescribed by the processing rules are performed for the purpose of investigating those things that are represented by the signs of the system. For example, genetic code is for investigating the functionality of genes, alphabets are for writing down language proceedings, cartographic signs are for producing charts and maps, etc. To achieve this end, specialists must, first of all, create relevant signs, group them, define the function of each group, and provide them with transformation rules. These transformation rules specify how to use each sign or each group of analogous signs, how to produce merged signs from the simple ones, and how to manipulate signs to derive plausible results. Let us take the development of chemical sign-systems as an example of this. Gathering knowledge about chemical elements goes back to ancient times. At first, these elements were associated with mystical forces and even distant bodies in the heavens. Hence, they were given the names of these heavenly objects; mercury is an example of a name like this that has been passed down through the generations to our times. Little by little, over time, people learned many actual facts about chemical elements, and assigned modern names to the

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

55

many new elements they discovered. In addition, the characteristics and qualities of these elements were identified, and they were divided into groups based on their traits. To make it possible to perform manipulations using the elements’ signs instead of the elements themselves, a symbol was introduced for each element. This was necessary because it is impossible to manipulate names – that is, words – in the same way that symbols can be manipulated. Symbols can easily be written, and coefficients and other supplementary marks can be added to them; this makes it feasible to perform transformations on them in accordance with the accepted rules of mathematical equations. All of this – the symbols, their supplementary marks, and the rules for transforming them – is collected in metalanguages of chemical sign-systems (there are many of them) that are studied by those who aim to become specialists in chemistry. In fact, studying these things begins very early, sometimes even in secondary school, because humanity as a whole considers chemistry a very important subject. From this example we can see how, over time, signsystems come into being. It also shows us that a great deal of time and effort was required to design them, and that they are tremendously important for the normal accretion of knowledge and investigation of phenomena. To sum up this short introduction, I would like to add that the incorporation of signs into sign-systems reveals new facets of the signs themselves, that sign-systems have manifold structures, according to which they may be classified, and that manipulating signs in the framework of their systems is the most important and fascinating part of semiotics. It is a wonder that this aspect of signs has not been given much attention in discussions of the general theory of signs. By contrast, in branch semiotics it has been dealt with properly, which is not surprising, as it is the heart of epistemological activity.

56

Chapter Four

The main functions of semiotic reality Semiotic reality is the reality that is constructed by signs. It is not virtual reality, as it is often called; signs are very real things, things that are perceived by our senses and appreciated by our minds. Like signs and sign-systems, semiotic reality has a double nature: it is expressed through signs, but it relates to a variety of diverse practical matters. People usually refer to it not because they want to investigate signs, but because they want to receive information about the things those signs represent. Since semiotic reality is expressed in signs, I believe it must be investigated within the framework of semiotics and not only in informatics or other sciences, as is done today. This investigation comprises the problems of collecting information that is expressed in signs, placing it in formats that will be readily understood by those who seek it later and will enable them to retrieve it easily, maintaining the information, and the process of retrieval itself. In the past, these functions were filled by books and other manuscripts; nowadays they are mostly dealt with in electronic form. In essence, with the advent of semiotic reality, a new type of activity was born – the active search for the most effective methods for solving the problems of semiotic reality. This includes new ways of maintaining information and supplying it to those who wish to utilize it. The principal purposes for which existing information is extracted from repositories are education, entertainment, and research. It is the latter that interests us most. People search for information in order to become well-versed in what has already been done in their fields. Every professional naturally wants to know about the previous accomplishments in his sphere of interest. To find this information, researchers refer to the collections of data that are stored on the Web and in other sources.

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

57

Semioticians must find ways to make it easier for researchers to locate the information they seek. But this task is not easy. At present, keyword searching is used for this purpose; sometimes this works well, but at other times it definitely does not. Still, the achievements in the field of data storage and retrieval are impressive and they are advancing quickly. These problems are closely related to those that are encountered in the process of developing techniques for properly classifying information into categories. People usually seek information in repositories of knowledge for one of two purposes: the continuation of ongoing research or the application of its results in new environments. These are both very important goals for the development of our civilization. Let us consider a few examples: An example of the former purpose is research performed by university students. Whenever these students have to write a paper, the first thing they must do is to read everything that has already been written regarding the topic of the paper. To do this, the students must either go to a library or access the Web by computer to gather the necessary information. In addition, after they compose their papers, they must append lists of the sources they used. As for applying existing results to a new time and purpose, one example I can cite is the introduction of existing alphabets into new territories. As is well known, alphabets were first invented in the Middle East. From there, alphabetical writing passed over to the ancient Greeks and Romans. Slavic languages borrowed it from Greek, and even preserved the Cyrillic letters. Each time the knowledge of the alphabet was transferred to a new environment, not only was the principle of alphabetic writing copied (it was a kind of revolution compared to earlier writing methods), some of the letters were also transferred intact and used for the same sounds as they were in the source language. Even so, a lot of changes had to

58

Chapter Four

be introduced at each transition – new letters had to be created for sounds that were not known in the source alphabet, diacritics had to be added to distinguish between similar sounds that were pronounced slightly differently, etc. At each stage, something distinct, and yet also conspicuously similar, was produced. The same is true of the dissemination of the Christian religion all over the world. In every country to which Christianity came, the core of the faith was preserved, but it was given slightly different packaging. On the other hand, when we come to the dissemination of the decimal system of counting, which was developed in India and then brought to Europe, the situation is quite different. This kind of sign-system had to be transferred completely intact. Formalized sign-systems, like the decimal system, are so detached from any real ontological inferences and lean so much on their semiotic embodiments, that they resist any changes to their formal structures.

What do signs really designate? I have kept the most interesting and novel philosophical considerations up my sleeve until this point. I am pulling them out now, for the first time in any of my works, and with a certain amount of trepidation. The generally accepted definition of a sign is that it is something that denotes (reflects, represents) something else apart from itself – and this is true. It is the truth, but it is not the whole truth. It is more accurate to say that a sign represents something from ontological or semiotic reality at some definite moment and under certain conditions. Let us elaborate on this definition. First of all, it is important to underscore that signs can designate something not only from ontology, but also from the semiotic reality I described briefly in the previous section. We do not only denote objects from the ontological world with signs; very often, we use signs to designate facts and expres-

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

59

sions that are of a semiotic nature. For instance, we may number the equations employed in a sequence of mathematical calculations, or we may denominate a fact that we found in a written text. We can work with signs that relate to semiotic reality just as we work with signs that denote ontological features. In fact, this is not at all an unusual circumstance, although nobody has pointed out this fact as yet, because the very notion of semiotic reality was not taken into consideration. Now that we have defined semiotic reality, we can include this very significant characteristic of signs in their definition. A second significant characteristic of signs is even more important: signs never stand for the total essence of their referents. Signs are representatives of their referents, but they cannot be substituted for them completely. They reflect only a part of what they signify (sometimes more of it, and sometimes less – it depends on the exact circumstances). Signs are like messengers that are sent on a mission: some ambassadors are more successful and eloquent, while others are less effective. When we choose our messengers, we sometimes have no choice and use whoever is available at the time. Let us analyze this point in greater detail. There are two general reasons why signs cannot fully represent the essences of their referents. The first has to do with the way signs are chosen. This choice is based on many variables, and many factors play a role in the process: the positions of the referent and of the creator of the sign, the tools we use, our own ability to complete the task, how deeply we have been able to penetrate into the depth of the matter we want to represent, and so on. The qualities of the sign we select can have a significant impact on how well the sign represents its referent. In particular, the quantum of abstraction of the sign greatly effects how closely the sign reflects its referent. The greater the sign’s degree of abstraction, the more stable the connection between

60

Chapter Four

the sign and its referent will be, because the differences in the qualities of the two will be less significant. The second reason that a sign cannot fully fill in for its referent is something of a philosophical nature: the referent rarely remains the same over time. Because the referent is constantly changing, its qualities at one moment may never coincide with its qualities at any other time. That is why alternative signs may sometimes be used for the same object under disparate conditions. But neither of these reasons truly gets to the heart of the matter. The main reason for the discrepancy between a sign and its referent lies in the fact that the two planes of reality are constructed from different building blocks. Ontological reality is built on individual objects and occurrences, while semiotic reality relies on signs. Signs cannot exactly coincide with the things they represent, for the simple reason that they are not those things; they are constructed from different “raw materials,” and their connections to other objects in semiotic reality are by nature different from the connections between the objects they represent and other objects in ontological reality. Because of this, signs may lead us to conclusions that contradict those we observe in objective reality. This is clearly demonstrated by the so-called philosophical paradoxes, which such outstanding figures as Zeno from Elea, Bertrand Russell, and Henri Bergson were famous for. The well-known paradox devised by Zeno spoke of Achilles and a turtle. In the scenario Zeno described, Achilles could never catch up with the turtle that was ahead of him, though he was much quicker than it. This is nonsense from the point of view of everyday experience. Still, this paradox has been repeatedly cited in support of the argument that we are unable to reproduce and understand the laws of the outside world. In view of what I have just said, however, this paradox is but a demonstration of the discrepancy between the ontological and semiotic worlds, and

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

61

it is quite trivial in light of our explanations. There are simple solutions for the “riddle” – even children in primary schools can solve the problem of Achilles and the turtle, if it is formulated in different terms. Still, the fact remains: the ontological and semiotic realities are interwoven and dependent on one another. But they evolve along different lines, each in accordance with its own laws and regulations. Using the laws of any particular signsystem, we can only approximate the ontological phenomenon represented by it. We can come very close to deciphering an ontological problem from within semiotic reality, but we can never cover all of it. This, though, does not prevent us from applying the partial results in our practical undertakings. Newton’s laws of gravitation were incorporated into the sum of human achievements, with great acclaim, in spite of the fact that their author did not understand the physical substance of this phenomenon. Even now, we do not understand it fully, but that does not prevent these laws from being useful to us for calculating the motions of celestial bodies. I shall dwell more upon the differences between the two realities later in this book; it is a very important issue that must be clear, if we are to understand the nature of semiotics. There is yet a third philosophical reason for the use of signs, one that is no less important than the preceding two we explained above. Some signs designate the metaphysical essences of their referents, whereas other signs denote their transitory and temporal qualities. Names and preliminary definitions remain permanently attached to their referents and represent their immutable characteristics. Many other signs may be used to designate the changing and transient features of the same referent. My name accompanies me throughout my lifespan, and, I hope, a little bit beyond it. The same may be said about some of my other features – for example, that I am a human, that I was born at a particular place of particular

62

Chapter Four

parents, and that I am a male (though this feature can be changed nowadays). All of my other characteristics are ephemeral, and the signs depicting them express secondary, albeit very important, qualities that I possess. This division of signs has tremendous implications for all of our cognitive activities. Signs enable us to speak about anything as if it remains the same in time and space for eternity, without defining it anew each time we mention it. If we had to define each thing again and again, every time we mention its name, it would make communication impossible. Yet, we implicitly understand that in reality it is not always the same object, that it is constantly changing, acquiring new and novel qualities and characteristics that would otherwise have to be expressed by means of additional signs. I see this quality of signs as very significant; I will come back to this topic frequently in the rest of this book.

The third type of reality: mental reality I was not satisfied with the two kinds of realities outlined above, so I added an additional concept to the scheme: mental reality. Though the relationship between ontological and semiotic realities explains a lot, there is another factor that is required for them to exist and function. That factor is the human mind and human will power. The individual human being is the decisive factor driving the two locomotives of ontological and semiotic reality. And the traffic flows in accordance with each person’s knowledge, will, and propensities. It moves along two different routes, but at the crossroads a human is standing, a person who regulates the actual meetings of the two paths. This is illustrated in the diagram below:

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

63

Diagram of the Three Realities 1. Ontological Reality (First and Second Nature)

3. Practical Occupations

5. Arts

4. Science

6. Mythology, Religion, Ideology

7. Education

2. Semiotic Reality (Signs and Sign-Systems) Figure 4-1

Some explanation of the diagram is in order. As I mentioned above, semiotic reality comes into being in the course of our dealings with ontological reality. The diagram above illustrates the process by which it comes into existence and the interactions between ontological and semiotic realities. I call this process the transmutation of existential events. When we are born, we find ourselves in the world of ontological reality (no. 1 in the diagram), a world that exists independently of us and to which we have to adapt in order to live comfortably. In order to adapt to our ontological reality, we begin to study it, both at school and by ourselves. This acquisition of knowledge, and the drawing of conclusions from it about ontological reality, proceeds with the help of signs. The crystallization of our thoughts is accomplished using signs – words,

64

Chapter Four

pictures, maps, diagrams, etc. – to elucidate them. All cultural creations – literature, ballet, sculpture, and so forth – are infused with signs. Our scientific investigations are performed using signs and their systems, and the results are also expressed in signs. All of these signs and sign-systems are gathered together in the special plane of our lives that I call semiotic reality (no. 2 in the diagram). Semiotic reality allows us to detach signs from the real things they represent and manipulate them in our minds. That is, we can transform signs in order to acquire new knowledge about the things they represent. If the signs we use were chosen well for the task at hand, and the rules we use to transform them are appropriate, we can gain new knowledge about ontological reality itself by transforming signs within semiotic reality. Once we have acquired the necessary knowledge and techniques, we can also use semiotic reality to help us adapt ontological reality to better suit our needs. Indeed, to some degree we can completely change ontological reality in this way. In fact, the ontological reality we face today is quite different from the ontological reality that humans first encountered. We can say that ontological reality has two facets, its original facet, which I call its first nature, and that which is added to it, which I call its second nature. Every generation of people encounters a different stage of ontological reality, and accepts it as a complete whole. They learn about their particular stage and then introduce further changes and improvements to it. Thus, over time, the ontology experienced by people undergoes an endless process of modification. This interplay between semiotic reality and ontological reality is represented in the diagram by the double-tipped arrows. The diagram does not only comprise the two types of reality and their mutual relations. It also shows some human activities between them, and that is the essence of the third type of

Philosophical Underpinnings of General Semiotics

65

reality. Each of us is involved in one or more of these activities. In addition, we possess certain attitudes towards both kinds of realities, and also towards the activities we undertake. Human beings are not inanimate matter, they are deeply affected by what they perceive and do. In the course of life, they take on certain views and beliefs that determine their attitudes towards their surroundings. They propagate their beliefs and oppose contradictory views. In short, they adopt an active stance both vis-à-vis their ontological environment and vis-àvis their semiotic environment; they accept and energetically advance some things, while they reject and equally energetically oppose others. This personal stance is what I call mental reality. It is present in every human being, regardless of whether they express it clearly or conceal it deep within their souls. Actually, this is the central point of the whole picture, because it defines the choices a person makes among the options available to him from his ontological encounters and from the semiotic possibilities that have been brought to his attention. To be sure, the third kind of reality has a mental origin, but that makes it no less real and influential in the transmutation of events in one’s life. People act mostly according to their convictions (though, of course, some compromise), and they are ready to suffer and even to die for their inner beliefs – recall the destinies of Giordano Bruno and Tommaso Campanella. That is why we cannot ignore this factor in all our deliberations on the subject. As to our narrower topics of the roles of signs and of semiotic reality in general, we shall come back to them in the next chapters.

CHAPTER FIVE SIGNS, SYMBOLS, AND THE FOUR BRANCHES OF SEMIOTICS

This chapter is comparatively short, but it concerns a very important issue. Many people view semiotics as a science not of signs but of symbols. If you search for the term semiotics on the internet, you will find many items that deal with semiotics from this angle. French writers are especially inclined to define semiotics as the science of symbols, and this generates many complications and misunderstandings. For this reason, I have chosen to discuss the distinction between signs and symbols in detail in this chapter.

The kind of symbols I have in mind In semiotics, there are a number of different meanings for the notion of a symbol. Based on the work of Charles Peirce, the established semiotic understanding of symbols is that they are one class of a tripartite scheme of sign classifications (icons, indices, and symbols). According to Peirce, this class of signs is the most conventional of the classes, and its signs are the most detached from their referents. This notion has been retained by most semioticians; I myself included it in my scheme of semiotic taxonomy, in which I applied it to the most advanced type of signs. But this is not what I mean by symbols in this chapter. In this chapter, I am focusing on the distinction between symbols and what I will call usual signs – namely, what we usually

Signs, Symbols, and the Four Branches of Semiotics

67

mean by signs. For this purpose, I must use very different criteria from those I used in the definition above. We have already defined usual signs. Now I will define what I mean by symbols in this context: a symbol is a sign that, apart from its denoting function, embodies a significant ideological message. In other words, a symbol does not just have a representational role; first and foremost, it serves some ideological purpose. And it is far more committed to its ideological purpose than it is to simply representing something other than itself. This is the sense I have in mind, when I refer to symbol and symbolism in this chapter. A usual sign is ideologically neutral. It just reflects something else, characterizing that other thing by revealing its traits and modes of behavior, by explaining its relationships with other objects, and by leading us from known facts to unknown ones. In this respect, ideological influences are irrelevant to it. From this we can conclude that usual signs reflect truths that are common to all people and not limited to any political or other type of ideological framework. You cannot legitimately ascribe any ideological impact to a physical or mathematical sign. (In the Soviet empire, this was not considered to be the case. Genetics and cybernetics were declared bourgeois sciences and it was forbidden to study them. But these were just the freakish ideas of the sick mind of the ruling dictator.) Symbols are not only saturated with ideological content, their main duty is to express and propagate this content. Let us consider some examples of such symbols. Christianity is the world’s largest religion1, with approximately 2.2 billion adherents. It is based on the belief that Christ was a messiah who died for all the people on the Earth, by being crucified on the cross. Hence the image of the cross became one of the 1

“Major religious groups,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_religious_groups.

68

Chapter Five

most popular symbols throughout the world. Many Christians wear crosses on chains around their necks. Priests bless their parishioners by performing motions that recall the form of the cross. And numerous people hang crucifixes in their homes. This is one of the most revered and worshipped symbols in the world today, one that is reproduced in immeasurable varieties and forms. Now, let us consider some less obvious examples of symbols. Every metropolis has a symbol: for Paris, it is the Arc de Triomphe; for London – the Palace of Westminster; for Moscow – the Kremlin; for Copenhagen – the statue of the Little Mermaid. But with these symbols the situation is more complicated: these huge urban conglomerates have very long histories, which have given rise to a variety of symbols for each one. Thus, for London, I could choose the Tower of London, for Paris – the Eiffel Tower, for Moscow – the statue of Yuri Dolgoruky (founder of the city). Note that we capitalize the names of these symbols. This is done not only because of their uniqueness, but also in order to underline their ideological importance. Symbols of another kind also exist. Literature has created a number of figures that are known all over the world and have been converted into symbols. Consider, for example, fictional detectives who are famous for their perspicacious minds, like Sherlock Holmes or Hercule Poirot. These characters have become symbols of people with brilliant minds who coolly analyze evidence and reach correct conclusions where others could not do so. Another such figure is that of Don Quixote, whose character has become a well-known symbol for people with altruistic views that do not correlate with reality. There is also the very well-known figure of Big Brother, who is omniscient and omnipresent. Big Brother is well-known not only from George Orwell’s book, in which the image was first introduced, but also from real life in totalitarian countries. Cul-

Signs, Symbols, and the Four Branches of Semiotics

69

ture and culturology, which only deal with ideologically significant matters, also use symbols. Political Science is another instance of a scholarly pursuit that is closely connected to symbols, as are hermeneutics, theology, and a number of other fields.

How symbols differ from usual signs Symbols have emotional implications, or, at any rate, are purported by those who affirm them to have such implications. Symbols are intended to become objects of reverence and even worship for believers in the faith, objects of respect and imitation for readers of detective stories, objects of admiration for those studying the exploits of Alexander the Great, and objects of fear and consternation for those who depend on the good will of a dictator. A usual sign has only one meaning and exists only for the purpose of representation. Over time, this meaning can be enriched and the spheres in which it is used can be expanded. Thus, röntgen (x-ray) radiation was discovered by Wilhelm Roentgen in 1895. This name became both the name of the phenomenon and its units of measurement (the basic sign was also called the röntgen). At first, it was only employed in medicine, to enable people to see inner parts of the human body that were otherwise invisible. Over time, its range of uses expanded. It came to be utilized in crystallography for measuring tiny crystals; then it was found to play a very important role in the cosmos and came to be used in astronomy; and later, additional uses were found for it. Every time the use of this form of radiation changed, its parameters also changed; again and again its meaning was redefined, new signs for its properties were added, and existing signs acquired new characteristics. Usual signs frequently undergo similar expansions and modifications.

70

Chapter Five

A very different path of development can be observed with symbols. They also change, but these changes primarily affect their ideological aspects. Thus, for instance, a Russian warship, a cruiser called Aurora, saw service in the Russian navy beginning in 1900. Over the years, it took part in many battles and performed many other functions, as a ship of its class was intended to do. But in October 1917, the ship happened to be employed by revolutionary leaders to signal the beginning of the Bolshevik revolution. From then on, the Aurora became a symbol of the revolution. It stopped being used as a warship, was moored in the Neva River, and became the focal point of excursions, demonstrations, and a great deal of admiration. Millions of books and leaflets glorified and idolized it, it found its way into textbooks, and it was mentioned millions of times in the media. People forgot its initial purpose and actions, and its ideological role became its hallmark. This is the way every symbol develops. Over time, the use of the Christian cross evolved. Originally, it was used to bless people, but later its use expanded to include blessing armies before battles (which was a gross violation of what Christ professed), and then to include blessing ships when they first set sail. The shape of the cross was incorporated into buildings, baked goods, and numerous other items. This was not done because using the cross served any practical purpose, but for the glory of Christ – that is, for ideological purposes. Another difference between usual signs and symbols is the audience that can potentially master and exploit them. Usual signs are intended to reach as numerous an audience as possible. They are aimed at the whole of humanity. Some signs (for instance, measurements of distance, time, weight, etc.) are so important that diverse communities make mastering them obligatory in their schools and assume they are known by all community members. In contrast, the knowledge and use of symbols is limited to the people in the group in which the

Signs, Symbols, and the Four Branches of Semiotics

71

symbol is accepted. As a rule, the use of symbols is forbidden outside to the group. In fact, there are even cases in which dissemination of symbols by group members outside of the group is a punishable offence. For example, this is typical of secret societies and criminal organizations. Yet inside a group, devotion to the group’s symbols is a must; being negligent in this regard can lead to expulsion from the group. Sometimes, failure to treat symbols with sufficient veneration is considered a criminal act for which people are tried in court (for example, desecration of the national flag). As I noted earlier, some well-known symbols are capitalized when they are mentioned in writing. This is also done as a token of respect to their ideological content. There are also some semiotic differences between usual signs and symbols. While usual signs tend to be united in sign-systems, symbols do not. Symbols prefer to stand alone. To be sure, some of them are collected into small groups, like the national symbols of a single country – its flag, coat-ofarms, and anthem. Even in these cases, though, they are connected by formal properties rather than the inherent characteristics that ordinarily bind the signs in sign-systems together. Each of the national symbols I mentioned was introduced and has developed separately, without any influence from or upon the other two members of the group. There is another semiotic trait that distinguishes symbols from usual signs. If we collect symbols of a particular type together, the collection takes the form of a roster: a list in which each item appears as “this is so-and-so” or “this is such-and-such.” For example, a collection of national flags is simply a list of countries with a flag for each one. Aside from purely formal connections – in our example, the fact that each image is of a national flag – hardly any ties connect the items in the list to one another. The choice of what to include in a

72

Chapter Five

collection of symbols is made by the person who compiles the collection, based on the criteria he chooses. At times, his choices may be influenced by rather irrelevant considerations. The kind of bonding found in lists of symbols constitutes the weakest of all possible ties that bind signs in a system. I call this type of bonding “the lowest aggregate state of a sign-system.” The inclusion or exclusion of isolated items in the system does not bring about any serious changes in the system as a whole, and does not impact upon the positions of other signs in it. It is like a telephone book – if you add entries to the phonebook, or remove them from it, the book remains stable. All other types of aggregate states in sign-systems have stronger ties among their signs and consequently lower entropy. Changes in the positions of some of them automatically lead to changes in the roles and positions of other signs in the same system. Take, for example, the signs in a game of chess; adding or removing pieces necessarily affects the roles and functions of all of the other pieces on the board. While adding or removing symbols from a collection has minimal effect on the other items in the collection, ideological transitions in society greatly impact on the list of accepted symbols. Revisions in ideology cause some symbols to achieve greater acclaim and others to be eclipsed. Thus, in Russia during the Soviet era, Maxim Gorky was considered the preeminent writer of prose, and Vladimir Mayakovsky was deemed the greatest poet. Nowadays, both of these writers have been dethroned, their writings have been subjected to intense criticism, and they have come to be appreciated less and less as time goes by. Clearly, changes of this kind are alien to the realm of semiotic cause and effect. The fact that symbols are subject to this type of effect is a clear indication that they are different from usual signs.

Signs, Symbols, and the Four Branches of Semiotics

73

But the most distinctive characteristic of symbols lies in the manner in which scientists describe them. Whereas usual signs are described by explaining their functions as members of a sign-system, descriptions of symbols are primarily based on their ideological nature. Historians outline the facts about how they attained their symbolic roles; ethnographers discuss their significance in the development of the communities they serve; and so forth. As time elapses, the symbolic role of a symbol gradually becomes more and more prominent and important; over time, the symbol infiltrates encyclopedias and text books, while the object itself retreats into the background and is forgotten. At this point, I would like to stress that the ideological aspects of individual symbols can vary from sphere to sphere, because every field of endeavor deals with symbols from its own point of view and with the methods it has developed for the purpose. Every field selects its particular subject-matter, the objects it deems relevant for investigation, and appropriate methods for analyzing symbols. Nonetheless, although these things are different in each field, they always share some basic semiotic principles in their approaches to dealing with this kind of sign. In conclusion, I want to state that symbolic signs also belong to semiotics, but they constitute a part of semiotics that is different from the parts that are dedicated to the problems of usual signs. Scientists who research symbols must remember that symbols will always be more a part of the field that makes use of them than of semiotics. These researchers must be very cautious to make sure they treat these symbols from a semiotic point of view, using semiotic terminology to reveal their properties as signs. For better or for worse, I myself take far more interest in usual signs than I do in symbols; although both types of signs belong to semiotics, the rest of this book, and my future delib-

74

Chapter Five

erations, will be devoted exclusively to the investigation of usual signs.

Summary In view of what I said in this chapter and in the previous chapter (about signs as they relate to non-human organisms and inanimate objects), I differentiate between four branches of investigation within the science of semiotics: 1. The semiotics of usual signs, which has thus far been the most influential and developed branch of semiotics (I also call this kind of semiotics general semiotics.) 2. The semiotics of signs used by non-human living creatures 3. The semiotics of symbols (as they were described above) 4. Semiotics for machines Of the four, the only one I have not discussed at all is the last one, which relates to inanimate objects. These are signs that people insert into lifeless things along with instructions about how to respond to each sign. An object that is endowed with signs cannot change their number, their order, or the manipulation rules that come with them. Changes in any of these can take place only with human intervention. And this is the cardinal difference between signs used by humans and those used by machines. Machines follow only those rules that they were programmed to follow from the outset, whereas humans are always aware of the rules of sign management, and very often alter them in order to improve the process of managing them. This cardinal difference leads to manifold divergences between the two approaches; this fact is the basis for my contention that this type of sign has a special place in semiotics. I think that in the future, these four kinds of semiotics will be studied separately, but within the framework of one scien-

Signs, Symbols, and the Four Branches of Semiotics

75

tific discipline. I propose that the first branch of semiotics I listed above, which has the greatest significance and is also the most established part of semiotics, take on the job of explaining the general principles of this science – its chief characteristics and concepts, its main philosophical underpinnings, and the like. This means that anything related to semiotics in general would be included in this part of the theory. All of the other branches of semiotics would be built upon the general theory; they would begin with the conclusions of the general theory, and adapt it as necessary to define the traits of their own realms and enumerate the ramifications of these traits. Each amendment of this kind would be based on extensive knowledge of the field under observation. Accordingly, the theory of general semiotics I present in this book belongs to the main branch of semiotics, the field dealing with usual signs. From this point on, it will only be usual signs that I explain in this work, and the examples I give of signs and signsystems will only be of usual signs and their sign-systems. I leave it to others, to people with expertise in areas in which other kinds of signs are used, to elaborate on the additional branches of semiotics.

PART II. ON SIGNS

CHAPTER SIX SIGNS IN THEIR SEMANTIC ASPECT

This chapter begins our examination of semiotics proper. We will commence with the first aspect of signs discussed by Charles Morrison: the semantic characteristics of signs – that is, their relationships with the things they represent. This is, in fact, the most basic of the four facets of sign analysis currently recognized: semantic, syntactic, pragmatic, and quantum of abstraction. (I introduced this latter facet in my works.) The semantic relationships between signs and their referents are addressed in the various definitions of signs that have been proposed by semioticians.

Chief properties of signs I have already cited the definition of a sign that was proposed by Charles Peirce: “A sign... [in the form of a representamen] is something which stands to somebody for something in some respect or capacity.”1 This definition is a good place to begin our discussion. It states that every sign has two points of reference: one in relation to what it represents (“stands for something”), and the other vis-à-vis the mind of a human being (“to somebody”). To clarify this idea, Peirce, Frege, and many others employed a diagram of a triangle, like this:

1

See page 42.

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

79

Model of an Individual Sign Sign

Referent

Notion

Figure 6-1

In the diagram, we can see the dual dependence every sign has on two factors, a referent and a notion. This is a very important point, because it prevents us from focusing exclusively on the representational aspect of signs – how they represent their referents – and ignoring the other fundamental aspect of signs, which relates to how people work with signs. In actuality, the entire process of creating and using signs is regulated by people, because it is people who select the appropriate signs for particular circumstances, define the procedures for processing them, and shape the way they function in general. Nonetheless, this simple triangular model can only be accepted as a preliminary step on the road to understanding the essence of signs. Indeed, in practice this model has been treated as preliminary by all the semioticians and laymen who have dealt with it thus far, and I certainly see it in this light, too. No matter how important it may be in helping us conceive of the nature of signs, it remains preliminary because

Chapter Six

80

the sign-referent-notion triangle does not explain a great many very significant things about the process of semiosis (inventing and using signs). For example, what is meant by reality? Should the notions in one’s mind only represent the signs, or should they also represent the essences of their referents? At the end of the process, what is really represented by signs? All of this remains vague and unclear in the triangle model. Thus, the triangle should be viewed as a rough sketch, an outline of the topic. Because of the preliminary nature of the triangle diagram, I have decided to draw some triangles of my own, as well as some other figures, in an effort to create new diagrams that provide more information about the way signs actually function. The first diagram I have prepared (figure 6-2) expands on the diagram in figure 6-1 above. This new diagram contains two triangles that, unlike the standard triangle depicted in figure 6-1, are not symmetrical. One of the triangles represents a sign that gets its meaning primarily from its closeness to its referent. In this triangle, the distance between the sign and its referent is shorter than the distance between the sign and our notion of its meaning. The other triangle represents a sign that gets its meaning primarily from the system to which it belongs. In this triangle, the distance between the sign and its referent is longer than the distance between the sign and our notion of its meaning. Sign

Referent

Figure 6-2

Sign

Our notion of it

Referent

Our notion of it

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

81

This idea adds many important nuances to our understanding of signs. If a sign is near to its referent, it can rely on its affinity to the referent and therefore does not require any help from other signs. For example, a photo of the bearer of a passport may be sufficient to affirm his or her identity. The more distant the ties between a sign and its signified, the more it must turn for support to other signs, to the sign-system in which it is included, and to the interpreter’s familiarity with the sign and its properties (i.e., to the notion of the sign in the mind of the user). I have even formulated a semiotic law based on this difference: The nearer a sign is to its signified, the less abstract it is, because of this proximity. The converse of this law is equally valid: The more distant a sign is from its signified, the more abstract it becomes, and consequently the more it must rely on a sign-system for support. The diagram in figure 6-3 shows a rather different aspect of sign denotation:

A sign

Many referents

Figure 6-3

Our notions of them in our minds

82

Chapter Six

Some signs stand for a single, unique referent. These signs are called proper names. This is the kind of sign that grew out of people’s first incursion into semiotic reality – people simply wanted to name things in order to be able to speak about them when those things were not present. Later, when people began to construct languages, they came to understand the impossibility of having a language based exclusively on proper names; human memory is simply incapable of storing so many signs. At that point, people moved on to using notions and concepts. Every notion and concept encompasses multiple referents, as illustrated in figure 6-3 above. This property of signs, that a single sign can include a lot of referents, has many far-reaching implications that will be topics of great interest to us. For now, suffice it to say that signs with multiple referents are clearly much more complicated and abstract than proper names are. The next diagram (figure 6-4), illustrates yet another way of classifying signs: dividing them into denotational and syntactic signs. Framework of a Sign-System

Denotations

Figure 6-4

Syntactic signs

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

83

This classification applies to the signs within a single signsystem. Denotational signs have their referents outside of the system. They introduce these referents into the system, which allows us to manipulate them in accordance with the rules of that system. By contrast, syntactic signs have no outside referents and their task is to help us deal with the denotational signs in the system so that we can transform them and derive new knowledge from the results of the transformation process. Syntactic signs are subdivided into two groups: syntactic proper and logical. Thus, in languages, conjunctions like as, when, or after are purely syntactic signs, whereas thus, and the pair either… or, act as logical indicators that assist us in correctly arranging denotations in ways that may be enlightening to us. The two triangles in figure 6-4 are shown as separate entities that adjoin one another. This exemplifies the division between denotational and syntactic signs: one triangle contains denotational signs, and the other contains syntactic signs. Both are incorporated into the same sign-system, and in this respect constitute one inseparable body. But their functions and roles are quite different from one another, and must be viewed separately. When a sign is incorporated into a specific sign-system, it acquires some properties that it does not have outside of the system. Among these is its syntactic role, which can only exist within the context of a sign-system. Syntax is what enables a single sign to have multiple, mutually exclusive meanings in different sign-systems. Examples of this phenomenon are manifold and very compelling. A linguistic example is the sign “x,” which has diverse meanings in different languages (i.e., in different linguistic sign-systems). In English, this sign is usually pronounced [ks], whereas in Russian it is pronounced as a variant of the sound [h].

84

Chapter Six

Another example of a sign that has alternative meanings in different sign-systems comes from the cultural sphere. The “proper” way to greet acquaintances is highly dependent on local custom. Ignoring these customs can have very serious consequences. For example, in France, if a man greets a woman he has just met by kissing both her cheeks, this is considered an accepted greeting sign. But, if a man does this in a traditional society in which unrelated men and women do not touch one another, he could well find that he has insulted his hosts and perhaps even endangered the woman. In this respect, we can say that as signs become more distant from their referents, they not only depend more on convention, they also rely more and more on the sign-systems to which they belong. As a rule, we can say that the ties between signs and their denotata are inversely proportional to the ties between these same signs and the systems they are included in. The stronger the ties are to the denotata, the less the signs rely on their systems. Or, conversely: the less a sign resembles its referent, the more its meaning is defined by the rules of the system in which it is incorporated. The rules of sign behavior in a sign-system are formulated in the metalanguage of that system. This is discussed in greater detail in the chapters devoted to sign-systems, in Part 3. The next diagram (figure 6-5) shows the integration of signs into the social structure. Every sign is born in the mind of an individual. If it remains exclusively in this mind, it continues to belong only to that person. To constitute a social phenomenon, a sign has to expand its range of distribution, and acquire general acceptance. Only when it does this does it become part of the generally accepted semiotic reality. When this happens, an additional bond comes into existence, one that reflects the interaction between the sign and its public acceptance, as depicted in figure 6-5.

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

85

Introduction of a Sign into the Social Fabric a sign

its referents

general acceptance

its notions in our minds

Figure 6-5

The incorporation of a sign into semiotic reality is a process that has many stages. At each stage, the number of users of the sign increases. Usually, the process begins with an individual person who conceives an innovation and then introduces it to colleagues or friends. Next, it appears in publications and is either adopted or rejected by the public. If it is adopted, it is used more and more, and in many variations, until it is so well-established that it is included in dictionaries and textbooks. It is difficult to say when a sign finally becomes a stable feature of human knowledge, but it is very important for those who include it in their speech or writings to know whether it is well-enough established to be understood by their audiences. If a word, or any other sign, is not understood by the audience, communication will fail, and the user will have to employ other signs, signs that are known to the listeners or readers, to clarify the meaning. The dissemination of individual signs progresses at different rates; and the extent to which they ultimately spread also varies greatly. Nevertheless, when people communicate with

86

Chapter Six

others, they use those signs that are known to their interlocutors, because this is necessary if communication is to be successful. This is why society is vitally interested in the distribution of signs into different social environments; this distribution is necessary if members of society are to understand one another. To this end, society disseminates signs through educational institutions, radio, TV, and computers. In sum, figures 6-1 through 6-5 above illustrate the main properties of signs. They are far from giving a complete picture – signs are so manifold and diverse that it is impossible to enumerate all of their properties. But for a preliminary, cursory look at the subject, they will suffice. In the discussions of these figures presented above, we touched upon the essence of the notion of a sign. I hope that it is now clear why I felt that a single triangle was too limited to support even a basic explanation of sign properties, and thus why I decided to complement the standard diagram in figure 6-1 with some drawings of my own.

The nature of signification The relationship between a signifier and its signified is called signification. In this section, we will focus on the nature of signification. What exactly does a sign represent, and what factors impact on the selection of a particular sign for a referent? To begin answering these questions, we must refer to another of my diagrams (figure 6-6), which shows the main determinants in the creation and honing of signs: the human mind and the laws of ontological and semiotic reality.

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

87

Signs and the Process of Signification Human Mind

Ontological Reality

1

2

Semiotic Reality

Signs

Figure 6-6

First of all, I want to draw your attention to the fact that we do not only signify objects from ontological reality; we also signify objects from semiotic reality. (In the diagram, no.1 represents a sign that signifies something from ontological reality, while no.2 is a sign that signifies something that only exists in semiotic reality.) People are no less fascinated by their encounters with facts that have a semiotic origin than they are when they come across natural phenomena or take part in social intercourse. Some scientists even find dealing with semiotic reality more attractive than dealing with ontological reality. Thus, one of the most prominent mathematicians of the first half of the twentieth century, Godfrey Harold Hardy, declared in his A Mathematician’s Apology that pure mathematics was much more interesting and meaningful than

88

Chapter Six

applied mathematics.2 By “pure mathematics” he meant innovations that make the sign-system that is known as “mathematics” more coherent and distinctive. And, of course, “applied mathematics” refers to mathematics that is directly used for practical purposes. Other mathematicians (for example, Alexei Krylov of Russia) have declared mathematics that lacks any practical applications in ontology to be entirely useless. Even though opinions like Hardy’s seem to contradict this notion, both are essentially correct. Improvements in sign-systems are very important because they make it possible to perfect those signsystems for practical applications in the ontological world. In the long run, ontology is the decisive factor in judging the value of a sign-system; but this is only true in the long run. In the short run, a sign-system can be valuable in its own right. Besides, there are sign-systems that are not completely dependent on the ontological world – art, religion, and mythology, for example. These systems usually develop their signs without any need for empirical confirmation and are justifiably judged exclusively by internal, semiotic criteria and their devotees’ approval. For the purposes of sign designation, the ontological and semiotic spheres operate as separate entities. Though both ontological objects and signs are real, they are different in their substance; and investigation of these two categories has different aims and different procedures. One realm in which this is apparent is when it comes to the verification of innovations. Whereas ontological innovations are verified by observing their practical effects, the impact of semiotic innovations is measured by how smoothly they are incorporated into the system and by the extent to which they increase the usefulness of the system by expanding its possible applications. 2

Godfrey Harold Hardy, A Mathematician’s Apology (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1940)

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

89

One example of a semiotic innovation that ultimately gained acceptance when it offered the users of its sign-system a new and useful application is imaginary numbers. When they were first invented, in ancient Greece, imaginary numbers were only accepted with suspicion. Even René Descartes wrote about them with derision. But when the complex numbers they generated were later found to be very useful for geometric constructions, they earned a respected place in the mathematical sign-system. Now that we have established that signs can represent objects in either ontological or semiotic reality, we can proceed to the other parameter of signification: the forces that are involved in the process of creating a sign. I have identified three of these factors: the laws of ontological reality (if we are investigating objects from ontology); the laws of semiotic reality that govern the behavior of the proposed signs; and the mind of the creator of the sign, which controls the selection of both of the other things. (In figure 6-6, the arrows represent the influence these three factors have on the development of signs. The human mind is at the top of the diagram, because it controls the entire process, but, as the arrows indicate, it must work in conjunction with, or through the agencies of, ontological and/or semiotic reality.) I have come to the conclusion that it is erroneous to ignore the influence of any of these factors. Yet the founders of the existing theory of semiotics only identified the first two forces as being involved in the process. For example, this is Ferdinand de-Saussure’s diagram of a sign, from his famous Course in General Linguistics.3

3

“Course in General Linguistics,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ Course_in_General_Linguistics; accessed March 2015.

Chapter Six

90

sign signifier signified

Figure 6-7

In terms of our current discussion, the above diagram can be explained as showing that in order to create a sign, the signifier must be taken from reality and endowed with qualities of a sign. No mention is made of the fact that the whole process takes place in our minds and is affected by them. Peirce, on the other hand, did not overlook the effects of the human mind in his definition of a sign. And we ourselves will follow in Peirce’s footsteps; we will not skip over the role of the human intellect in the process of creating a sign. Let us begin by analyzing the process as follows. Our first question is: what is it in the denoted object that can potentially be signified by a sign? The answer cannot be that a sign includes all aspects of the signified. If it did, it would not be a sign, but a duplicate of the signified. Clearly, that is not the purpose of creating a sign. A sign cannot reflect every aspect of its referent by matching them point for point to something in the sign; a sign is always less than a complete prototype of its referent. To see what I mean, you need only look in a mirror. In the mirror, you will see your image – the most exact copy

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

91

of yourself in existence at the moment. But this image is still not you in entirety; a lot of things are missing in the image. Similarly, no matter how complete and compelling the description of a character in a story may be – even if it includes so many details that the character seems to come alive – it still falls short of being a whole person. Finally, consider the phenomenon of electricity. We may investigate electricity as a natural phenomenon, derive hundreds of formulas that define its behavior, harness it in scores of practical applications, and still not know everything there is to know about electricity. Clearly, the signs we use for working with electricity do not reproduce it exactly, since we do not even have that knowledge ourselves. In sum, an object can be denoted with a range of different signs, but none of them will ever achieve more than a weak resemblance to its prototype; no matter how many signs are created for an object, all of them will be deficient in comparison with the original. The question then arises: what is it exactly that is being designated or denoted by a sign? The answer is this: A sign denotes a part of the whole signified that reflects the inner essence of the signified in some way. What is reflected in a sign is a tiny embodiment of the essence of the referent. And when different kinds of signs reflect this essence, they reflect it from various angles and with different degrees of generalization and detail. This is, in fact, why we can denote one object with a number of different signs; each one encodes multiple details, some of which may not even exist concurrently and may only be manifest under specific conditions. I suggest naming what is identified by a sign the informational content of the referent at the moment of designation. This description draws attention to the fact that the signified may itself change or evolve over time and in accordance with certain cirumstances that accompany the

92

Chapter Six

process of signification. We will enumerate some of these points in greater detail later on. The most important thing to understand from our current discussion (and the discussion in chapter 3) is this: some signs denote the very essence of their referents (which I call the metaphysical nature of the referent), while others denote additional, more variable qualities of their referents. The metaphysical nature of any referent consists of two things: its name and its preliminary existential definition. A name accompanies its bearer from the beginning of its existence to the end, and even long afterward. The preliminary existential definition of a referent characterizes its particular immutable essence, by distinguishing it from all other entities (both ontological and semiotical). Signs that do not refer to either of these essential properties aim at denoting the ever-changing attributes of the referent or, in my terminology, the informational content of the denoted item. This latter kind of sign (and there are innumerable quantities of them) are subordinate to names and preliminary definitions. They may also include definitions, but they are all subordinate to the preliminary definition and they all embody transitional qualities of their referents. Consider any signified object that exists in ontology (which we shall call a). No matter what this object is, it does not remain unchanged even for a moment. Only its name and initial definition remain fixed; the object they designate is already transformed a moment after we assign these signs to it. This means that even the equation a = a is wrong, and Frege’s use of two different terms, meaning and sense, is not adequate for solving the problem. The only possible and clear outcome from this logical complication is to understand that the signified belongs to one plane of our existence and the signifier, to another. These two planes interact, but nonetheless remain different in their essenses. The first plane

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

93

is ontological reality, and it develops in accordance with its own laws. The second plane is semiotic reality; it is the product of our minds. Its existence can be learned from the fact that its laws only partially coincide with the laws of ontology. To explain what I mean, I will introduce a rather unusual example, which is from a poem. At the beginning of the 20th century, Vladislav Khodasevich, of Russia, wrote a poem called “Looking into the Mirror”. Here is my rather clumsy translation of this poem: Me, me, me – what a morbid expression. Is that one really me? Did my mother love this ghost With half-greyish hair and yellow skin And with the wisdom of a sly serpent?

The idea is brilliantly expressed. You need only look at old photographs of yourself from the course of your life to understand my point. The photographs will be stikingly different from one another, even though all of them are of the same person. Alas, this situation is unavoidable. But it nontheless leads us clearly to the conclusion that signifier and signified are different entities; they are entwined into a single gestalt, but they are not similar in volume, in size, or even in nature. The fact is that a sign continues to “live” even after its real-life referent ceases to exist. As I will explain in greater depth in the next chapter, the functions of signs and referents in the gestalt are different. The function of an essential sign is to name its referent, to single it out from all other entities, and thus to designate its uniqueness. All other designations of the same object simply elaborate on the first impression by clarifying the picture and adding important particulars to it.

Chapter Six

94

A new model of a sign We can produce signs of many semiotic varieties, but every one of them will depend on three foundations: on the signified object, on the semiotic means we choose to represent it, and on our mental dispositions and abilities. And, as I mentioned above, the last element is no less important than the other two. The signified object is in constant flux, and it drags its sign along with it on its continuous path of change; its sign or a series of signs try to collect all the alterations into one seguential entity with one unchangable nucleus; and our minds govern the whole process and disentangle its intricacies. With this in mind, I cannot be satisfied with the simple triangle chosen by Peirce to explain what a sign is. As an alternative, I suggest a triangular prism, like this: Human mental abilities

Added traits from semiotic reality

An object from ontology with all its traits Figure 6-8

All of the elements in the prism diagram together constitute a sign. What is the difference between this image of a sign

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

95

and the simple triangle that is accepted today? In the simple triangle, we only see the lines of the triangle linking the three elements, whereas in my figure I also want to show the three planes where these elements are worked upon and reshaped in different ways. We observe objects in ontological or semiotic reality, and they are connected with other objects that may or may not be relevant to our subject. We designate these objects with various signs and thus include them in a sign-system, where they are understood according the laws of that specific sign-system. And in our minds, we imagine them in our own individual ways, each of which is an outgrowth of our personal backgrounds, which are specific to each and every individual. How do the three elements work together, given these inconsistences? They can cooperate only if we coordinate them first in the plane of semiotic reality. This, in fact, is the main purpose of semiotic reality. When we include a sign in semiotic reality, we try to give it an accepted and unique meaning, one that is stable under all external influences. If we succeed, we can be sure that people will be able to communicate using this sign; if we do not succeed, the sign will not further communication among people. Such preliminary work, which proceeds incessantly in semiotic reality, is necessary in order to guarantee that people can comprehend one another’s ideas. It is this unending work, which takes place in the three planes of my figure, that I wanted to show by expanding the sides of the triangle.

Integration of the three sources in a sign If we say that a sign does not connote the whole of its referent, but only a part of it, we have to answer two questions: “Which part does it designate?” and “What are the reasons that it designates this and not another part?” As I explained above, I call the part of the signified object that is reflected in

96

Chapter Six

its sign the informational content of the signified object. This informational content can be defined as the state of the object at the moment the sign was created and under the conditions of signification that prevailed then. This means that signification at any other moment and under other conditions would result in a different sign (or different signs). The first part of the answer is quite clear – since the signified is constantly changing, its reflection in the resulting sign will be different at different times. The example given by Frege exemplifies this situation: Venus in the morning (morning star) differs from Venus in the evening (evening star), so signs depicting the planet at various moments should be diverse. Yet very often we use the same designation in both cases: we say, “How bright Venus is today,” both in the morning and in the evening, and we say this quite explicitly. This means that the name and the definition of an object are signs that reflect the very essential core of what they designate. All other signs imply additional properties of the object, whereas its name and initial definition refer to its very essence. It is not by chance that the first thing that is done after the discovery of a new and previously unknown thing is to give it a name and, if possible, add some sort of definition for it, even if that definition is provisional and makeshift. Later on, these two things may be transformed as they become more established and meaningful – the name little by little stabilizes, and the definition is given more details and formalized in light of our newly developed familiarity with the object. Thus, when Röntgen discovered his famous rays, he called them “xrays.” Later on, they came to be called “Röntgen rays” in his honor. They also came to be used in different fields, and were given more extensive and precise definitions. Since ancient times, formulating correct definitions has been considered to be the foundation of correct thinking. Aristotle, for example,

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

97

held this to be true. And philosophers have reaffirmed this view time and again over the years. Yet, even after receiving these two designations, a name and a definition, objects tend to be given new signs all the time. Why is this necessary? The reasons may be of an ontological nature or a semiotic nature, or they may lie in our social and individual needs. In the next section, we will discuss each of these causes.

Ontological reasons for creating new signs Why do people constantly create new signs for the same object? As I explained above, we do this in response to the fact that every ontological entity is changing all the time. Although it has a single name, and even a more or less stable definition, the designated object resides in a permanent state of metamorphosis. Objects vary in terms of how quickly their alterations become visible, but they are all changing at all times. Sometimes, the process of change is conspicuous and easily discernable; at other times, the visible effects of alteration are not discernable by human eyes, because they are so slow in comparison with our lifespans. Thus, cosmic bodies seem to us to be quite unchangeable, even though their alterations are always under way, because their changes occur too slowly for us to see. In this context, we can say that the signs of constantly changing objects are what stabilizes them in our minds. We go on calling them by their old names and using their existing definitions even though we know that they have already changed. If we did not do this – if we used a different name for an object every time we talked about it, our conversations would be impossible to follow. When the old, established name and definition of an object remain intact, it cements our deliberations about it, making them continuous and coherent.

98

Chapter Six

Semiotic reasons for creating new signs In addition to the ontological reasons for our constant search for new signs, there are other reasons, which are all related either to semiotic reality or to the way the human mind works. They boil down to the fact that semiotic reality tries to process signs according to its own rules – rules for classifying signs and rules for processing them based on those classifications. On the semiotic plane, hierarchical classes of signs are defined and sorted, and the logic for dealing with each class is wrought separately. The rules for dividing signs into proper nouns, notions, and concepts are among the most important rules of this kind. Each of these three categories possesses its own algorithms for the analysis and processing of signs. I will write more about this in the chapters dedicated to semiotic reality. It is obvious that in ontology these categories do not exist. There are no generalizations in nature. In nature, we only come across concrete objects and processes. Generalizations appear only when we want to unite somewhat analogous occurrences in our minds – when we mentally analyze discrete phenomena to deduce special rules for processing things that are alike in some way. To deduce such algorithms, we work with signs and not with material properties, even though these signs can only be brought into existence after we study ontology. Once we have derived rules in this way, we can apply them to analogous real-life situations. All rules of logic belong to semiotic reality and only after they are formulated in semiotic reality can they be applied in the various areas of our practical concern. There are also other reasons of a semiotic nature for repeatedly defining new signs for known things. The following are among those reasons:

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

99

1. Our desire to show the changing referent from differing viewpoints: When we show an object from different angles – by taking a series of photographs of a single object, by describing the same scene in a literary text from various points of view, etc. – we try to produce as full and continuous a picture as possible, and every individual sign becomes an integral part of the series. 2. Changes in the vantage point from which we depict the referent: We usually choose the most convenient point of view for observing a referent, but this is not always possible. When we set out on a walk in the forest, we take note of the most prominent features as we pass them, so that we can use them as signs to guide us on our way back out of the forest. From our vantage point, these features are navigation signs, and we pay special attention to the aspects of these features that can help us navigate. On the other hand, if we get lost in a forest and are looking for a way out, we may climb a very high tree and look around from up there. When we climb the tree, we change our vantage point to try to get our bearings, and most likely create new navigational signs from the objects we see below us. In the same way, astronomers looking at the most distant places in the cosmos through very sophisticated and expensive telescopes select objects in the sky to use as guideposts. 3. Improvements or changes in the tools we use for designation: Our tools always improve simply from being put to use, and we also often invent new tools and instruments. Consider, for example, the medical apparatuses that enable us to view the insides of people’s bodies. Each tool has its own region to survey, and records its observations with various signs. Often, our choices are limited and we are obliged to perform signification

100

Chapter Six

with the most effective tools we can access in our immediate surroundings, like the proverbial artist who drew preliminary sketches on a napkin in a coffeehouse. Even so, artists generally prefer to create their masterpieces in their workshops, where they can use the best tools and facilities they have available to perfect the signs they produce. Last but not least, the most decisive factor affecting our ability to produce an effective sign is our ability to do it properly. This factor belongs more to our mental and physical capabilities than to the semiotic parameters of the situation. It plays a critical role in producing a good and stable sign that has a chance of being accepted into the treasury of semiotic reality. Because of this, throughout our lives we must hone our propensities for extracting effective signs. In view of all that I have said so far, I think it would be appropriate to add a corollary to the standard definition of a sign that is accepted today. This definition can be stated as follows: “A sign is a material entity whose presence or absence represents in the mind of its interpreter something else beside itself.”4

To this, I would add: “What is represented is the informational content of the sign’s referent at a definite point in time, as understood by the interpreter, using the means at the interpreter’s disposal, and with a particular purpose in the interpreter’s mind.”

4

This very important fact, that the absence of a sign can function as a sign, is elaborated upon in the Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms in supplement 3; see page 352.

Signs in their Semantic Aspect

101

Finally, I want to add a few words about human participation in the process of semiosis – the process of producing signs. Human action is crucial at every stage of the process. It is people who orchestrate the progress of the whole undertaking. We select the facts in ontological or semiotic reality that are to be investigated. We define the methods that will be used during the investigation, the tools that will be employed, and the sequence of our actions. We also decide which weapons from the semiotic armory we will activate in each case. Furthermore, the human factor becomes even more significant after we succeed in producing a promising end product. It is then that we have to introduce the product as the collective property of some social community. The burden lies exclusively on the producer’s shoulders; the goal is to disseminate the new ideas among the largest possible audience. One of the diagrams of signs above, figure 6-5 was dedicated to the problem of distributing new signs among the public. I recommend that you have another look at the diagram; you will see it in a new light now that you have read this section of this book. In sum, some of the primary characteristics of signs and of the process of signification (semiosis) were dealt with briefly in this chapter. There is a lot more that I left for further discussions, in which I hope to provide you with a lot of other important ideas concerning this vast and inexhaustible topic.

CHAPTER SEVEN SIGNS IN THEIR SYNTACTIC ASPECT

What is syntax? The next aspect of signs that was discussed by Charles Morris is their syntax. Every sign, even signs that are used alone and do not belong to sign-systems, has syntactic properties. Admittedly, the syntax of signs that stand alone is hidden and covert. Consider, for instance, a sign of a “skull and crossbones” on a transformer cabinet. This sign is usually used without any additional explanations, but its meaning is clear because the cabinet implies the meaning of the sign: “Do not touch – this is dangerous.” In this type of case, the location of the sign is its syntactic property. By contrast, signs that do belong to a sign-system must have some syntactic potential for connecting with other signs in the system in order to create the extended stretches of signs that are called text. When signs advance to the level of text, they merge with other signs into ever more complicated forms. It is these complex forms of interconnected signs that we will describe in this chapter. The notion of text is usually used to describe linguistic extracts, but in semiotics we use it to designate any extended string of signs that represents a complete and finalized idea. In addition to linguistic text, this definition encompasses the notes of songs (musical text), maps (cartographic text), and many other composites of signs. Text can be divided into meaningful units of smaller scopes – parts, passages, paragraphs, and finally, syntagmas (the tiniest units of multiple signs with a definite understanda-

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

103

ble content). Each of these types of extracts includes signs that are linked to one another in accordance with the syntactic rules of the system to which they belong. And each individual sign is endowed with vested syntactic traits that can be described and analyzed before the sign is put to use. This last point is very important. When we overcome the limitations of isolated signs by creating sign-systems, the role of syntax among the signs becomes crucial. As we develop and expand our sign-systems, the syntactic components of signs come to the fore and their denotational characteristics gradually retreat into the background. This process unfolds in direct relation to the degree of abstractness of the signs involved. That is, in less abstract sign-systems, the role of syntax is not as decisive as it is in highly abstract systems. Consider, for example, a natural sign-system like that used to follow a wild animal by tracking its spoors. Of course, a lot of syntax is incorporated into this sign-system, as evidenced by the great deal of tracking experience required to decipher the intricacies of the footsteps. But, even so, the capabilities required by the pathfinder are more in the realm of skills than in the realm of understanding the theoretical underpinnings of the sign-system, which shows us that this is not a highly abstract system. As we look at various types of sign-systems, we can see that as the abstractness of their signs increases, the systems’ syntactic components encroach more and more on the denotational components, to the extent that, in some systems, the latter disappears completely. We can observe this phenomenon in purely mathematical or logical sign-systems, in which variables occupy all of the syntactic positions. In these systems, we only endow the final results of the transformations

104

Chapter Seven

with a concrete and practical sense by converting the variables into the real-life features they represented.1 In light of what I have said thus far in this section, we can define syntax as a means for organizing denotational signs in a sign-system in a hierarchical fashion that enables us to transform these signs in order to acquire new knowledge about the things they represent. No less important is the fact that syntax belongs to semiotic reality. When we gather enough facts about some aspect of ontological reality, we can sit down and invent the rules that allow us to learn more about the subject at hand by working with signs instead of dealing with their ontological prototypes. Then, and only then, can we create a suitable sign-system, with algorithms for transforming the signs so that we can gain new knowledge about their referents, knowledge that will be useful to us in further practical applications. The work involved in formulating syntactic rules takes a long time and is very strenuous. In linguistics, it is built upon the toil of hundreds, if not thousands, of specialists inventing rules for the proper use of numerous words in different positions in texts. Yet this work is necessary if we want to furnish potential language users with correct and coherent speech, both oral and written. Doing this is like providing soldiers with a proper and effective armory before a battle; life and death depend on ensuring this provision. The syntactic traits of every sign-system are formulated in its metalanguage. They usually consist of two parts: enumerating the signs of the system and presenting the syntactic qualities of each of them. Chess is a strictly formalized game whose rules must be learned before beginning to play. Each piece has a name and possesses a role that is clearly defined 1

The relationship between sign abstractness and syntax is discussed in greater detail in chapter 9. In particular, see “What is the ‘degree of abstraction’ of signs?,” page 142.

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

105

before you start moving it. The roles of the pieces are the syntax of the system. Mastering their roles in a short time is possible, because there are only a few types. By contrast, large sign-systems, sometimes with enormous scopes, like languages and mathematical systems, also exist. Yet, despite their vast proportions, we still try to follow the ideal of defining the syntaxes of these systems as completely as possible. To this end, we create general dictionaries and grammars of natural languages. In general dictionaries, we gather all of the basic signs of each natural language (or, at least, as many of the basic signs as we can possibly collect – the more the better), all of the words and word combinations, and explanations of their meanings. And, in grammars, we elucidate the syntactic rules of these natural languages. Since the syntactic rules for each individual word differ, our grammars collect the words into groups whose syntactic behaviors are similar (e.g., nouns, or verbs), and describe their behaviors as groups. But, because there are innumerable exceptions to these rules, even within the groups we create, our grammars must list numerous individual exceptions to every rule they contain. These exceptions remind us that, in principle, the ideal grammar would explain the meaning of each word, and its syntactic behavior, individually. Gathering them into groups is somewhat less than ideal, but it makes the work feasible. After all, even in chess we do not explain the rules of processing for each pawn separately, but rather define the rules once for the entire group of pawns.

Levels of syntax I distinguish between four levels of syntax in sign-systems. The four levels, in order of their degree of formalization and complexity, are:

106

Chapter Seven

1. Morphological syntax: The first and simplest level of syntax, which is implemented within the framework of the basic signs of the system 2. Syntagmatic syntax: The second level, which is implemented using syntagmas 3. Sentence syntax: The third level, which is applied within sentences 4. Textual syntax: The forth level, which deals with connecting together the elements of a text – paragraphs, passages and other types of complete text (including the entire text itself) The processing rules of a sign-system are only concerned with the behavior of two kinds of signs: the basic signs of the system and the signs that appear in the course of transforming those basic signs. Only the basic signs of a system are analyzed and endowed with special rules for their processing. In chess, the basic signs are the chessmen themselves; in alphabetic writing, letters are the most significant basic signs. Among traffic signs, images are the dominant basic signs, and the same is true of the cartography of the earth. We can illustrate how the four levels of syntax work by taking linguistics as an example. As I have already explained, the basic signs of every linguistic text are words. Linguistic texts can include words, numbers, diagrams, and other elements, but the backbone of every linguistic sign-system is signs that are of a linguistic nature, and central among them are words. For this reason, in this section we will discuss words that appear on the different levels of syntax. Before we go any further, I want to underline that we are now analyzing the syntactic elements of language systems vertically – that is, we are looking at the successive stages of the vertical development of syntax. There is also a horizontal dimension to syntactic development, which relates to the ways in which words that belong to the same morphological level

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

107

may have different properties because of their origins. These words may enter into the language directly from their real-life prototypes, or via transformations of words that already exist in the language. Horizontal analysis allows us to differentiate between simple words and complex words. Complex words, which comprise two (or more) words of the same language, are what I call merged signs. Merged signs make up a very substantial group of words, and after their introduction into a language, they become full-fledged basic signs. Every language has grammatical rules that define how complex words can be formed and used. These rules are very important, and I will come back to them later on, in Part 3, when I discuss sign-systems in greater detail. Now, let us return to our discussion of the four levels of syntax. On the first level – namely, the morphological level – we encounter words that belong to different grammatical categories. Each of these categories has its own paradigm of possible morphological changes. In English, nouns change in response to number (singular and plural) and some of them also have special possessive forms. Each form has its own usage rules. In some languages (Latin, Russian, and others), the declensions of nouns have numerous forms, all of which are collected in grammatical paradigms. These paradigms are studied by those wishing to master the languages to which they apply. They provide potential users of the languages with all the possible forms of every single word in the language. I call the process of learning the paradigms of words the morphological level of preparing learners for employing those words in speech. This theoretical knowledge is necessary before the words can be used in real speech (although it also needs to be complemented by knowledge of the other syntactic levels). When words are combined to create the smallest meaningful units, they are governed by a second group of rules and algorithms, one that is entirely different from the rules of the

108

Chapter Seven

morphological level. These are the rules of the syntagmatic level, in which the basic signs are the structural components of sentences in a text: the subject, the predicate, the object, etc. Since every language includes many types of sentences, the possible combinations of their parts, and the range of possible sentence structures, are numerous. The syntagmatic rules of each language regulate the constructions that can be used, the parts of speech that can be included in each construction, and other related requirements. They specify, for example, how the subject can be expressed, qualified, and used in various situations. They also introduce systemic peculiarities in the rules characteristic of particular languages, of which there are many. For example, they tell us that in English when a plural noun that is included in the subject of a sentence is qualified by an adjective, the adjective is not changed into a plural form. By contrast, in some other languages, syntagmatic rules require the qualifier in such a case to be converted into the plural. Similarly, the syntagmatic rules of English tell us that if the predicate is in past tense, changes must be made to some of the other syntagmas of the sentence; this is not the case for other languages. The next level of syntactic construction is the sentence level, which relates to complete sentences. Every language supports numerous types of sentences, and has a special set of rules regulating their construction. Besides the rules governing the various syntagmas of a sentence, there are also rules for affirmative sentences, negative sentences, questions, exclamations, requests, etc. At this syntactic level, the basic sign is a sentence. When this level of syntax is studied, sentences are compared, their construction is explained in detail, and the rules for their correct use in oral and written speech are taught. The final level of syntactic construction is the textual level. This level of syntax elaborates the rules for combining sen-

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

109

tences into paragraphs, passages, and whole texts; the rules for formatting a text and dividing it into separate units (paragraphs, chapters, etc.); and the use of punctuation marks. The basic sign at this level is text itself. Various kinds of texts can be compared and evaluated at this level, but the logic of analysis is different from the logic applied in the preceding levels. At the previous levels, we usually moved from the basic signs up to more complicated signs, but at this final level we move down from the whole to its lesser parts. In order to correctly evaluate a text you must have the entire text before you, and begin by moving downwards to its excerpts, paragraphs, etc. Ultimately, though, both directions of analysis – top-down and bottom-up – are possible when you work with a text, and, for a complete analysis of the text, they are always used together, in combination. What I have written above is, in a nut-shell, the theory of the four syntactic levels in sign-systems. One question we can pose about this theory is whether it applies to all kinds of sign-systems, or is specific only to language systems. My preliminary answer is that I am not sure that it suits all systems, but it does seem to apply to most of the systems I am aware of. Let us, for example, try applying it to chemical reactions. The morphological level includes chemical nomenclature – the designations of all the elements that have been discovered up to our time – and the symbols employed to represent atoms of these elements in molecules. These morphological standards include rules for representing atoms with specific valences, and these rules pave the way for describing transformations that result from chemical reactions. The syntagmatic level of syntax in chemical notation is used to describe combinations of molecules in substances. The full representation of a reaction may be called the sentence level, and the repre-

110

Chapter Seven

sentation of a sequence of such reactions constitutes the text level. The same scheme may be applied to algebraic constructions. At the morphological level, there are a number of Latin letters, and their syntagmas are embodied in algebraic formulas, like (a + b)2. Their sentence level is a complete equation, and a series of equations constitutes a complete text or a part of it.

Basic signs in sign-systems Basic signs are the most important part of any sign-system, and all the other kinds of signs in the system gradually evolve from them. But basic signs themselves begin with nomenclature signs that represent the core of the matter that is being dealt with in the system. Initially, the nomenclature signs are not encumbered with syntactic characteristics, but they do serve as the material for further manipulations. Still, all of the nomenclature signs in a system must have a homogeneous ontological and semiotic nature, and all of them must also have the same degree of abstractness. In chemistry, the nomenclature consists of the symbols of all the known chemical elements and their names in words, as they are presented in Mendeleev’s table. In musical notation, it includes seven notes and their names. In geometry, it consists of the three axiomatic notions: point, straight line, and plane. On the syntagmatic level, these notions form different figures (triangles, rectangles, etc.), each of which also has a name in words. The fact that nomenclature signs are always translated into words is worthy of our attention, and we shall speak about this later on in this chapter. The nomenclature component of a system may be tiny (as in traffic-light semaphore) or enormously large (as in natural languages). Regardless of the quantity of nomenclature signs in a system, every one of these signs must have its own algo-

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

111

rithms that define its behavior in different circumstances. When the system only contains a few such signs, each one is treated individually. When there are a large number of nomenclature signs in the system, they are usually divided into groups for this purpose, so that it becomes possible to formulate processing rules for the signs in each group. Thus, with traffic lights, we can easily formulate rules for each light: the “red” means wait, the “yellow” indicates that the light is about to change, and the green light tells you that you may cross the street. In languages, on the other hand, we formulate rules for grammatical categories like nouns and adjectives, and, because even these groups have a tremendous scope, we subdivide them into many subgroups, and build our rules separately for each subgroup. Moreover, even these subgroups encompass numerous exceptions. Nomenclature signs are usually simple, including only one signification: chemical elements are assigned one or two letters to indicate their names; notes in music are represented by a circle in a particular place on the music staff; alphabetic writing is based on the letters of a concrete alphabet, etc. Even so, in their practical applications, nomenclature signs are usually transformed into more complicated images. The signs for chemical elements incorporate their isotopic variations, which are denoted by diacritic additions to their original notations: hydrogen (1H – no neutrons; also called protium), deuterium (2H – one neutron), and tritium (3H – two neutrons). These three substances, which have different numbers of neutrons revolving around the nucleus of the hydrogen atom, and, consequently have unique characteristics, must be treated in different ways in reactions. To indicate this, they are given distinct names and their signs are given additional components by adding diacritics to their initial forms. Similarly, musical notes are drawn differently to show their distinctive traits in a concrete musical text. Diacritics are added to the note signs,

112

Chapter Seven

for example, to designate the durations of the sounds: a dot to the right of a note indicates that its sound is prolonged; and breve, semibreve, minim, and other notations may also be inserted to show the length of the sound. In the same way, in linguistic writing, different diacritics are added to letters to indicate changes in the pronunciation of a sound. I call signs with diacritics like the ones I described above isotopic signs. Note that isotopic signs are used to indicate that we are dealing with a single substance with slight variations, and not two different substances or the integration of two substances that produces a third distinct substance. If we want to show the integration of two or more substances, we must use more sophisticated methods by employing merging signs. For this purpose, we begin at the syntagmatic level: in musical notations, this level is where designations like slurs, portamentos, and tuplets are found; in chemistry, this is the level at which denotations of chemical compounds that include a number of ingredients, like water (H2O), or hydrochloric acid (2HCl), are located; and in linguistic systems, this is the level in which word combinations like “a beautiful girl” exist. But even this level of syntax exists only as a preparation for the third level of syntactic relations, the level of sentences. In chemistry, this will take the form of a chemical reaction (2HCl + 2Na ĺ 2NaCl + 2H); in musical notation – a musical phrase; in speech – a sentence. Finally, the combination of reactions, of musical phrases, or of linguistic sentences, into a coherent text completes the set of syntactic computations involved in the merging of different signs.

How new basic signs are introduced Initially, basic signs are usually derived from people’s encounters with the ontological world and with semiotic reality, as well as from their observations of various occurrences that take place within these realities. When we come across new

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

113

phenomena that are not yet known to humanity, we investigate them and express the results of those investigations in signs. During this process, we begin to create nomenclature signs and introduce them into the terminology used in the sign-system we are bringing into existence. The stages of the creation of nomenclatures reflect the stages of the maturation process of a science. For example, chemistry already began to gather names for known substances in ancient times, but the very notion of what constitutes a chemical substance was not settled until modern times. It was only in the 18th century that Antoine Lavoisier (1743-1794) introduced an actual system of chemical nomenclature. His Traité Élémentaire de Chimie (1789) was the first modern textbook of chemistry, and it presented a unified view of the theories of chemistry up to that time. In the book, he enumerated four groups of “simple substances,” which comprised a total of 33 items. For example, he introduced a group of substances called “earths” that included “chalk, calcareous earth” and “barote, or heavy earth.” In 1869, Dmitri Mendeleev introduced his own classification of chemical elements (note that he did not speak of “substances”), which he presented in a table containing 63 elements. Each element had its own symbol and possessed a large number of established properties. Mendeleev arranged the elements in the table according to one of these properties – their atomic weights. Today, we use a modified version of his table that includes about 120 chemical elements; their names and symbols constitute the nomenclature of the main chemical sign-system currently in use. As you can see, the nomenclature of chemistry has matured along with the science itself. You may have noticed that some nomenclature signs have two designations, a symbol and a name. In some highly abstract sign-systems, the most important task for the users of the signs is to invent new techniques for transforming the

114

Chapter Seven

signs – techniques that enable users to glean new information about the properties of the signs’ referents (in either ontological or semiotic reality). Not every kind of sign is well-suited for such a role; only highly abstract symbols that are united in special formulas or expressions can be used successfully for this purpose. Try to work with Newton’s laws with their formulas expressed in words instead of symbols, and you will understand what I mean. Signs that are less abstract than symbols are simply unequal to the task. That is why, in systems like chemical reactions or physical calculations, we employ symbols rather than words when we want to perform transformations on signs in order to derive new results. Words, though seemingly equal to symbols in meaning, are best used for other ends, like explaining what is going on, or for giving intelligible instructions for the process of transforming signs within equations. Over time, nomenclature signs constantly increase in number, and so do the properties of the signs themselves. In very large systems like natural languages, the number of nomenclature signs can reach enormous proportions. When this occurs, the question of how to help people learn and remember the signs arises; after all, human memory has its limitations. Two methods exist for creating new nomenclature signs that are relatively easy for people to remember, as I will explain below. As usual, I will discuss linguistic sign-systems first. The easiest way to create new linguistic nomenclature signs that people can remember fairly easily is to build upon existing words. When this is done, new words are created by taking a source word with a known meaning and adding a new part, such as a prefix or suffix, or by modifying existing parts of the word. Words that are created in this way are called derivatives. In languages, there are a vast number of affixes that are used to create derivatives of this type. In English, some examples are -able, -ness, -ly, and un-. These are entities that

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

115

really do produce new words with their own meanings and processing paradigms. The meaning of a derivative word is sometimes very predictable, but not always. It is important to distinguish between derivatives like the ones I described above, which are new words, and what I call morphological derivatives. Adding affixes (prefixes, suffixes, infixes) to a root, to a stem, or within a word, may indeed lead to a new word, but it may also lead to another form of the same word. We use affixes and endings to accommodate existing words to particular positions in syntactic constructions. In so doing, we make the existing words morphologically capable of performing their roles in these constructions. In cases like these, we cannot say that we have created new signs, but only that we have produced modified versions of the original ones. Examples in English of affixes that can be used to create morphological derivatives are the suffixes -ing and -ed. We find the same method of producing new signs in other sign-systems, for example, in the English transcription system. In this system, square brackets are used to indicate that the symbols within the brackets are transcriptions of the sounds people use to pronounce particular words or parts of words. That is, the characters inserted between the square brackets are phonetic symbols. One such sign is [j], which represents a sound that merges with the vowel following it in a predictable way. Accordingly, [ju], [ja], [ji], etc., represent sounds of this kind. Knowing this propensity of the [j] sound, people began to use it in other languages in different combinations of letters and transcription signs. In Russian the sound [jo] is expressed either by the combination of the two letters “ɣɨ” (ɇɶɸ-Ƀɨɪɤ = New-York) or by a special letter “ɺ”. Creating derivatives of existing words is a very popular method for producing new words in languages. Note that after new coinages are formed, they do not enter a higher level of signification, but remain in the roster of basic signs (and ap-

116

Chapter Seven

pear in dictionaries and grammars of the language as basic signs). These new formations are easily discernable both in their forms and in their meanings. People familiar with the root word and with the affix guess the meaning of the resulting construct and quickly remember it, which, after all, is the whole point of the exercise. Another method for creating new signs from existing signs is to join two (or, on rare occasions, three) word stems in order to coin a new sign. Unlike the method discussed above, in which a single stem was united with one affix that is accepted in the language in order to create a new word, in this case two independent words are combined to produce a third, new word. But the effect of both methods is the same: a new sign, one that is easily comprehended and readily remembered, is created. Consider any word that is a compound of two words and you will see that the meaning of the resulting word is quite obvious. For example, the meanings of the compound words “icebreaker” and “heartbreaking” (as in “heartbreaking news”) are highly transparent. Imagine how much more difficult it would be for entirely new words with these meanings to become well-known and commonly used in the English language sign-system. I do not mean to say that people have no trouble understanding new constructs, but once they have correctly guessed the meanings of new words or arrived at their meanings based on the hints that are built-into the new words, they usually remember them well. In every sign-system, clear-cut algorithms exist for both of these methods – adding affixes to existing words, and combining two existing words – of merging existing signs to form new signs. We study these algorithms when we are in the process of mastering the signs of a particular sign-system.

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

117

Syntactic rules for processing signs in a sign-system Until now, we have only discussed the syntactic rules for creating new signs in a sign-system. But the main function of syntax is to govern the correct processing of signs at each of the syntactic levels of the system. There are specific rules for morphological, syntagmatic, sentence, and textual levels. In addition, there are syntactic rules for combining these levels to make them suitable for use in the system as a whole. These are the most interesting of the rules. Here are some examples of such rules. For the sake of diversity, we will begin with an example from the field of technical drawing. Assume that the basic signs of this sign-system are various elements and figures that are included in the system’s formal axiomatic and in its metalanguage. The elements are various forms of lines (straight, curved, etc.), and the figures are circles, squares, and other geometric shapes. In the not-so-distant past, these objects were drawn manually by draftsmen, but nowadays they are generated by computers. These elements give shape to the blueprint; at the lowest level (the syntagmatic level), the blueprint contains a number of linked objects; at the next level (the sentence level), it contains plans for specific parts of the project; and at the top level (the text level) is the entire blueprint, which contains a plan for the entire project. Each level is built in accordance with special syntactic rules, rules that are different at each stage. Of course, in practice the process of creating the blueprint does not always progress perfectly smoothly from stage to stage. For example, details that are located near one another cannot always be united comfortably in one node. When this occurs, the draftsman must adjust the drawing in some way, using whatever techniques he can think of to fit everything into the drawing in a satisfactory fashion. For instance, he may choose to draw a detail of a particular

118

Chapter Seven

section of the blueprint separately in a different location on the page. We find the same issues in the realm of linguistic composition. The rules of composition demand that word forms be coordinated with their contexts. For example, there are rules requiring uniformity between a qualifier and the word being qualified – like the rule that requires an adjective to be appropriate for the number, gender, and case of the noun it qualifies. In practice, it frequently occurs that as we compose a text, we find ourselves relating to a single entity in the singular in one location and in the plural nearby. At this point, we look for the best way out of the problem, and ultimately resort to the best design that comes to mind. This is an example that illustrates the fact that, despite the existence of formal rules for a particular step in the processing of signs, the final version is always selected by humans. At this juncture, I would like to elaborate on a notion that I touched upon at the beginning of this chapter: in highly abstract sign-systems, syntax has a relatively strong role, on account of the denotation components of signs. This is a very important point, and I want to dwell on it in detail. In our efforts to decipher the mysteries of the world in which we find ourselves, we humans have three footholds. One is the problem we are studying, the second is the tools we use to study it, and the third is our mindset – our previous knowledge on the subject and the mental resources we can utilize to expand that knowledge. To observe the circumstances of the phenomenon we are researching, we use all the senses with which we were endowed. They are rich, but still limited. To overcome this obstacle, we invent special tools: for seeing afar, we use telescopes; for seeing small substances, we use microscopes; for hearing, we have special devices that magnify and enhance sound; etc.

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

119

Among the most effective tools we have are the signs we invent. They not only help us to construct other tools, but also to record what we discover and to continue working on it later. The important role of signs in this respect is not only the recording of the things we learn as our investigations progress, but also that they enable us to go beyond these discoveries by uncovering new properties of the objects and processes that were recorded in signs. Our minds are able to do this by applying the rules of logic to the facts we already have and to their patterns of development and change. Consider, for example, the discovery of the planet Neptune. Neptune was discovered using mathematics. Before 1845, Uranus was widely believed to be the most distant planet. However, astronomers observed that Uranus was not always in the position predicted for it. The astronomers concluded that the gravitational attraction of a more distant planet was disturbing the orbit of Uranus. In 1845, John Couch Adams, an English astronomer, calculated the location of this more distant planet. Urbain Leverrier, a French mathematician, independently did similar calculations. In 1846, John G. Galle and Heinrich d’Arrest of the Urania Observatory in Berlin, looked for the planet where Leverrier and Adams predicted it would be located. They saw the planet, which was later named Neptune, on September 23, 1846. The discovery of Neptune was greeted with great amazement, since it was the first discovery made “from the tip of a pen.” Since then, this method has become quite common in science, and a lot of discoveries have been made in the same manner. What can we deduce from this? First of all, we can enthuse over the ingenuity of men. Secondly, we can see that by manipulating signs, we can make conjectures about the things they represent without having any contact with the things themselves. I call this quality of signs their predictive

120

Chapter Seven

force. Of course, our conjectures must be tested in real life to either affirm or negate our predictions. The predictive force of signs and sign-systems depends on their degree of abstraction. While natural signs do possess predictive force, it is very feeble. If I go to collect mushrooms and see a mushroom or two in a particular place, I can guess that I will find some other mushrooms there. This prediction based on extrapolating from signs (the mushrooms I saw) may prove either to be correct or not. The practical test is readily at hand, of course: I need only look for other mushrooms. Either I find other mushrooms or I do not. Either way, the problem is solved immediately. The predictive force of iconic signs is much greater, but it is still connected with the close proximity of images to their referents. If I follow a geographic chart to reach a particular location, checking off landmarks as I go, I progress more quickly and directly than I would have progressed in the search for mushrooms, because my progress is systematic. By contrast, if I use linguistic signs, like written directions, to navigate, I get my bearings through changing from one source of information (my environment) to another (the directions), and that is an additional hurdle. Finally, mathematical models may lead me to my goal with the utmost accuracy, especially if I use mechanical instruments, like a GPS receiver, to verify the route. In short, abstract signs penetrate to the most substantive characteristics of an issue. They describe the most profound patterns of their objects’ behavior, patterns that cannot be observed either with our eyes or with the help of mechanical devices. On the other hand, practical testing of predictions that are derived from the manipulation of abstract signs may, of necessity, have to be delayed a very long while after the predictions are made.

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

121

As the role of the denotational signs in a system diminishes, the role of syntax is enhanced, so that syntax gradually begins to occupy a much more conspicuous place in the system. This is quite understandable. When we are working with abstract signs, we cannot gather information directly from their referents, because the referents are conceived in our minds and are not available to our senses. Consequently, we must work with the syntactic bonds of signs, which signify the signs’ place and significance in the whole. This becomes our single refuge in very abstract situations. Sometimes, new inventions are so abstract that people doubt their very existence. When this occurs, the science from which they developed undergoes a crisis, the previous paradigm is rejected, and ultimately, a new paradigm replaces it. If we do not find an appropriate new paradigm, the crisis may continue for a very long time. Many critical situations of this type have come about in the history of science. I have already mentioned one of them: the invention of imaginary numbers2. According to the legend, imaginary numbers were invented in ancient Greece, but people did not believe in their existence or in their usefulness. (That is why they were called imaginary.) It took a long time for mathematicians to find a practical use for these numbers, but when they succeeded in doing so, imaginary numbers were properly introduced into the mathematical corpus. Another such crisis in sciences (note that they always occur in very abstract sign-systems) happened recently, at the end of the 19th century. This was a crisis in mathematics that created a rift between the leading mathematicians of the world at that time. It concerned the theory of sets that was proposed by Georg Cantor (1845 – 1918):

2

See page 89.

122

Chapter Seven

Georg Cantor’s achievement in mathematics was outstanding. He revolutionized the foundation of mathematics with set theory. Set theory is now considered so fundamental that it seems to border on the obvious but at its introduction it was controversial and revolutionary. The controversial element centered around the problem of whether infinity was a potentiality or could be achieved. Before Cantor it was generally felt that infinity as an actuality did not make sense; one could only speak of a variable increasing without bound as that variable going to infinity. That is to say, it was felt that n ĺ ’ makes sense, but n = ’ does not. Cantor not only found a way to make sense out of an actual, as opposed to a potential, infinity but showed that there are different orders of infinity. 3 This was a shock to people’s intuition.

Some less intensely controversial but nonetheless illustrative examples of these types of developments in science can be seen in modern-day chemistry and physics. As long as chemists were studying inorganic objects, they were satisfied with the established linear designations of chemical reactions. But when they began dealing with organic substances, they encountered properties that were so abstract that the old signification system was insufficient. To solve this problem, they had to invent structural signs for polymeric materials and benzyl-like circular images. In the new signs, not only atoms were designated, but also their syntactic bonds. A similar thing happened in physics at the beginning of the 20th century, when the study of atoms reached its apex. It was at that point that people developed a sign-system for quantum mechanics that was fully based on the syntactic qualities of the signs. In the history of the sciences, there have been many other crises of the kind I am describing, but we need not go into 3

Thayer Watkins, “Georg Cantor and Cantor's Theorem,” http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/cantorth.htm; accessed March, 2015.

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

123

them now. My point in mentioning the crises above was to demonstrate that in highly abstract systems of signs, denotational elements cannot play a crucial role, and their place must be taken by the syntax of the system.

Functional signs Signs that represent something from ontological or semiotic reality – something that is brought into the system and can be processed by the system’s rules – are called denotational signs. They constitute the bulk of signs in every system. Thus far in this chapter, we have discussed the syntactic parts of individual denotational signs. Now I want to concentrate on a different type of signs: syntactic elements that are included in sign-systems from the outset to serve as regulators of the systems’ functioning. I call these elements functional signs. These are the signs in a system that govern the transformations of its denotational elements. Functional signs can be divided into two subclasses. One class includes functional signs that were borrowed from commonly accepted logic; I call signs in the first group logical signs. The other class comprises functional signs that were created specifically for the particular sign-system in which they are used, which I call syntactic signs. Signs in this latter group are part of the system’s metalanguage and must be taught to users of the system before they can begin manipulating signs within the system. Logical signs Logical signs regulate the rational and consistent disposition of all the other signs in system applications. They are borrowed from the generally accepted stock of logical indicators and are specially explained in the metalanguage of each system in which they are used. They are usually expressed by

124

Chapter Seven

means of special words from the natural language that is spoken by users of the sign-system: if… then (or simply if), either… or… , consequently, etc. In any text, many logical composites of such signs are included. Note that these indicators appear in all kinds of sign-systems, irrespective of their degrees of abstraction. In some sciences, like, for example, mathematical logic, words that are otherwise used as logical indicators are replaced with symbols. Mathematical equations are especially likely to be interspersed with logical signs or their symbolic equivalents. Logical signs are widely known and are as close as signs can get to being recognized by the whole of humanity. Their dissemination to a still larger audience is only hindered by the fact that a single meaning is signified with different signs in various languages. For example, consider the conjunction “and.” This conjunction is implemented differently in various natural languages, although the ampersand symbol, “&,” compensates for this problem to a certain extent. Perhaps this is how many other logical notions that are worthy of universal usage can be introduced into the common usage of all human beings. Syntactic signs Syntactic signs are specific for every sign-system. They do not exist outside of their systems and only serve the syntactic needs of the specific system in which they were created. There are three categories of signs in this group. They are: signs for depicting a semiotic field; signs depicting semiotic fragments (parts of a complete field); and syntactic signs proper, which regulate the denotational signs used in the construction of the entire text.

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

125

Signs that depict a semiotic field or its fragments I call the framework in which a sign-system is used its semiotic field, and the identifiable parts of a semiotic field its fragments. Every sign-system has its own semiotic field, and every semiotic field has a size, form, and borders. To explain what I mean by this, I will give a few examples: The semiotic field of chess is not very large or complex. It has a quadrate form and is divided into squares. There are 64 such squares on each chessboard, and each chessboard has equal numbers of white and black squares. These squares are syntactic fragments that together compose the complete semiotic field of the chess board. A checkerboard is built in the same way as a chess board. But, while each player in a game of chess begins playing with 16 pieces of various types, only 12 uniform pieces are used per side in a game of checkers. This difference between the two games makes them completely distinct, and allows them to have entirely different sets of rules. Thus, each of the games has a distinct semiotic field. A basketball court has a semiotic field that is different in size and shape from a chessboard. It is rectangular in form and is usually of standard dimensions (using different scales). Its fragments are not equal: the field is divided into the central part of the court and the basket areas, each of which has its own markings. Maps of the earth show the land masses of our planet. They represent three-dimensional surfaces in two-dimension form, which leads to some irregularities in their representation of the actual configurations of the land masses. The map is divided by a grid of parallels and meridians, which divide it into fragments that depict objects from ontology in their actual locations. All the fragments are assembled within the borders of the map (i.e., within its semiotic field).

126

Chapter Seven

The semiotic fields of sign-systems that have a high level of abstraction are built differently from the ones I described above. They are mostly linear in form or are found within abstract geometrical figures and diagrams. The reason for this is simple. Abstract constructions are abstract because they express our uncertainty about the real-world structures of things we conjure in our minds. As long as these sign-systems exist exclusively in semiotic reality, they remain in the realm of highly abstract signs and their semiotic fields. Only after they are embodied in the form of material semiotic models or final products do they acquire their real-life concrete forms. (Note that real-life models do not belong to the world of signs; they are something different. They are also distinct from semiotic models like a model of an imaginary atom or of the solar planetary system.) Syntactic signs proper While there are relatively few logical signs, syntactic signs are very plentiful. In less abstract systems, syntactic signs appear in smaller numbers. In natural systems, they are rare; denotational marks are preferred in these systems, and syntax appears ad hoc in practical manipulations with natural objects. This is because we act in response to the results of the previous steps – whether they are successful or not – when we work with natural sign systems. In iconic systems, syntactic signs often appear as part of denotational signs. For example, in road signs, they appear in the geometric shape of the sign or in the color of its border, while its central part is given to denotation. The shape and colored border give the sign additional meaning, indicating that the sign gives information, advice, or a warning. In languages, syntactic signs abound. Entire parts of speech, like conjunctions and some prepositions, are syntactic signs. Apart from words, there are other syntactic signs in

Signs in their Syntactic Aspect

127

languages, like punctuation marks, intervals between words, and paragraphs. In chemical notations, there are arrows, which show the direction of the reaction, equalizing marks, and many other similar signs. As I have already explained, in more abstract chemical signs, syntactic signs appear within structural diagrams. In formalized systems, syntactic signs are the core of sign production, while denotation is left to variables. In these systems, syntax fills the central role in the process of signification. Thus, when we study algebra at school, we are given formulas as syntactic patterns and we learn to work with them automatically, without necessarily understanding why we are doing so. The topic of autonomous syntactic signs is a new one, even for me. It should be investigated in far greater detail. What I have written in this chapter is only a first step in the fleshing out of this topic.

CHAPTER EIGHT SIGNS IN THEIR PRAGMATIC ASPECT

The third dimension of sign analysis suggested by Charles Morris is the pragmatic aspect of signs, which concerns the relationships between signs and their users. In this chapter, I will elaborate on some points of interdependence between signs and human mental abilities. Before we begin discussing this topic, I must repeat again that, in my opinion, only humans can be users of signs. Lengthy argumentation is not required to prove this point. It is simply based on the fact that the users of signs are those who bring signs into existence, interpret them, research them from various angles, live among them, and turn to them for support in various life situations. Only humans can be said to do all of these complex things.

The human mind develops by mastering signs Without a doubt, humans began to rely on signs before they could even formulate their importance and their role. In this respect, they behaved like animals; and animals continue to conduct themselves in the same way to this day. Like animals, people used signs instinctively at first, but this only remained true until they invented languages. Once they invented languages, they could name all kinds of signs and give them definitions. From that moment on, signs began their existence as such. Names and definitions, even the most primitive ones, are necessary precursors of signs. You can observe an object, manipulate it, even draw an image of it, but you cannot comprehend it as a representative

Signs in their Pragmatic Aspect

129

of something outside itself without naming the thing it signifies and delineating some of its traits. When you introduce somebody, you say: “This is Mr. A… He is a…” If you were showing someone a photo of the moon, you would probably say, “This is a photo of part of the surface of the moon. The moon is a satellite of the earth.” Naming and initial general characterization are necessary for explaining the meaning of a sign to others as well as to ourselves. A sign remains imprisoned within the mind of the individual who created it unless it becomes the property of many. And only in this capacity, as the joint property of many people, can it enter semiotic reality and become part of it. At first, people found their signs in nature, among the entities and phenomena of their daily lives. These signs helped them survive in a very difficult and challenging environment. As time went on, people began, little by little, to conceive of artificial signs – signs that were the fruits of their mental efforts. Over the course of human civilization, a tremendous quantity of signs has been conceived. They are so numerous and diverse that it is very difficult to classify them all with a single classification system. Charles Peirce, in the course of his long and fruitful career, tried to create a general classification of signs, but, alas, in vain. I have found a roundabout way of creating such a classification system; I classified signs (or, rather, defined their initial taxonomy) based on the different types of sign-systems in which the signs were included. I have already written about this in the first part of this book.1 At this point, I only want to reiterate the same idea by presenting it in the form of a schematic showing the hierarchic sign taxonomy. (You can see another version of this schematic on the cover of this book; it has become something of a trademark for me.) Here it is: 1

See page 31.

Chapter Eight

130

Types of Sign-Systems and the Signs They Employ

Figure 8-1

In this diagram, I show the essence of each of the groups of signs in my classification system. These groups allow us to analyze all extant signs and classify them into a small number of coherent classes. The value of this scheme lies not only in its introduction of a structure that gives us a more exact and practical classification system for signs than we have had until now. Its greatest value consists in that it gives us criteria for gauging signs’ level of development and crystallization. The scheme is hierarchic – each level of signs emerges from the one below it. Only after people master (at least partially) a lower type of sign, are they able to move on to the next level and, concurrently, to the next stage of their mental maturation. I see the mastering of each sign level as directly related to the growth of our minds; the signs we are able to use and the lim-

Signs in their Pragmatic Aspect

131

its of our mental abilities are closely intermingled in this process. Moreover, the direction in which the two develop together as they grow is from a less abstract position to a more abstract one. Signs develop in that direction, and humanity as a whole, as well as each individual in his own right, follow suit. Once we have “arrived” at the top level of the hierarchy, we can see all of the levels, from the most abstract signs at the top to the least, at the bottom, and understand and make use of them. When people take possession of a new sign level, it is a positive indication that their minds have taken a significant step forward. This is what I see as the first and chief type of interaction between signs and the humans who use them.

People seek to live among their favorite signs A second important connection I see between people’s development as individuals and my sign classification system relates to the particular types of signs that appeal to specific people. Each of us is endowed by nature with particular predispositions – propensities towards ways of life and behaviors that suit us well. These preferences are easily discernable by the signs that attract us, sometimes irresistibly. From among the signs that surround us on all sides, each individual selects, and willingly integrates into their lives, either natural signs (direct interaction with real-life occurrences); images (various forms of art); the propensity for working with notations of some kind (usually, linguistic activities); or, finally, highly abstract matters of a mathematical or similar nature. This natural endowment may be latent before it becomes evident to the person himself and to others. It may also be influenced by the person’s education and upbringing. Ultimately, though, in most cases it reveals itself at some point. The earlier it is revealed, the better, since knowledge of one’s predispositions prevents a lot of frustration and suffering. The

132

Chapter Eight

only reliable way to identify a person’s inclinations early on is to pinpoint his propensity towards signs of a particular kind.

Quick reactions to signs we come across Those of us who pay attention to the things they encounter and react to them quickly and effectively are better adjusted to practical life than those who are inattentive or indifferent to signs. In real life circumstances, signs are often given to us in their latent forms or even in obscure guises. If we have the capacity to detect them and to react responsibly to them, we can prevent a lot of harm and inconvenience and find a reliable and effective way to sort out whatever problem we are dealing with. I do not mean that every collection and arrangement of signs leads us to a direct and guaranteed way to deal with a particular issue. On the contrary, in systems whose signs are of low abstraction, the appearance of a sign frequently presents us with a number of options, and we, the users of the signs, must select the right ones from among all the possible choices. I say that this is most relevant to systems with a low degree of abstraction, because the signs in these systems are present in their potential state. I call such signs potential signs. Here are some examples: Imagine that you are in a forest and have lost your way. A huge number of objects surround you, and each one of these objects can be activated and become a real sign that can help get you out of your predicament. But, at the outset, these signs only have the potential to become real. You find a tall tree and climb it, and then you are able to see the way out of the forest. While you are up in the tree, you select various landmarks to help you find your way out when you return to the forest floor. Through this process of selection and your use of the signs you chose to guide you as you walk, you will have created the only real signs out of the many potential signs that were available to you; by utilizing their potentiality to your

Signs in their Pragmatic Aspect

133

benefit, you will have converted them from potential signs to actual ones. This situation is typical of natural and iconic sign-systems. Another example of this is a case in which you become ill and go to your doctor for medical treatment. The doctor faces a multifaceted and as yet undeciphered picture. He has to choose, from all of the possible signs, only those that will lead him to the right diagnosis. Through this process, he changes their status from potential to real signs. The role of professional qualification and intuition in such cases cannot be overrated. When the signs and sign-systems in use are more abstract, even highly qualified professionals are frequently unable to solve problems of this nature. The only way to use such signs is to get them in their “prepacked” state. I, for example, cannot prepare my food out of natural components, so I buy food that is already prepared. Then, I just warm up the dishes I bought and consume them. The same thing occurs with highly abstract signs. Very few people are able to manipulate highly abstract signs in such a way that they arrive at an acceptable result. Most of us must rely on a genius to prepare a formula for us out of the signs, so that all we must do is replace the variables in the formula with concrete values, thus reproducing actions we were previously trained to undertake in order to arrive at the required result.

The human factor in creating new signs and sign-systems In both of the variants I described in the preceding section, the role of the human factor is decisive in the creation and use of the signs. The human factor has a still greater role in new scientific revelations. Only recently, I found the following item in the news:

134

Chapter Eight

A new moon orbiting outer planet Neptune has been discovered in old images of the planet taken by NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope, bringing its retinue of satellites to 14. Astronomer Mark Showalter spotted the moon as a blurry white dot on July 1 2013 as he was studying the faint arcs of irregularly-shaped rings around the remote bluey-green world. He decided to widen his examination of the images beyond the ring system and the dot caught his eye. When he went to check more than 150 other archived images taken by Hubble between 2004 and 2009, he found it recurred again and again.2

Now that this new celestial body has been discovered, astronomers have to name it and define some of its qualities. In the sciences, the naming process has some peculiarities. Usually, nominations are taken from some arbitrarily chosen source. For example, the names of the subdivisions of the Geologic Time Scale (GTS) were initially based on the names of the places in which evidence of those time periods was first found. In the 18th and 19th centuries, European geologists started making detailed observations of fossils and rocks; their investigations led them to conclude that there were great similarities among fossil and rock formations across large areas of Europe. The locations where rocks were studied were often used to name new geo-chronologic units within the GTS. Many of the names are still in use today, including: the Devonian, after the English county of Devon; Permian, after the region of Perm in Russia; and Jurassic, from the Jura Mountains in central Europe. By contrast, the names of some other geologic time-periods have much more varied origins. Consider, for example, the geological eras called Paleozoic, Mes2

Paul Sutherland, “New moon for Neptune found in old Hubble images,” http://www.sen.com/news/new-moon-for-neptune-foundin-old-hubble-images.html; accessed March, 2015.

Signs in their Pragmatic Aspect

135

ozoic, and Neozoic. Let us compare these two systems of nomination. In the first one, the nomenclature is quite arbitrary and does not tell us anything besides the places where the names were created. The second system not only gathers names, but indicates their sequence as Early, Middle, and Late layers (as indicated by the Greek roots in the names). Clearly, the second system is more informative than the first one. Names of celestial bodies are usually taken from ancient Greek and Roman mythology, like the planets Mars and Neptune. Over time, this tradition has mostly continued, although it has also diversified somewhat. The name given to a new celestial body is first established within the academic community, and only later becomes accepted among the public at large. Like every new name that is chosen by scientists in any field, it must go through a long and drawn-out process before it is fully accepted. First, it is added to special dictionaries of the field in which it was created, then it is incorporated into general dictionaries, and after that, it is included in educational materials, including school textbooks. All of this proceeds with the active participation of the scientists from the relevant branches of knowledge. I call this lengthy process the logic of application of signs and sign-systems. This kind of logic adjusts sign-systems for different categories of users. Later in this book, I will discuss this very important issue more.3

The human factor in restoring old sign-systems Semiotic reality has existed as long as human civilization has. Throughout its existence, it has gathered and disseminated different sign-systems. At times, the civilization that creates certain sign-systems perishes, and then, as a result, the sign-systems that were in use in that civilization also cease to exist. In some cases, people who live later on, in other civili3

See “Logic of application,” page 195.

136

Chapter Eight

zations, succeed in restoring and comprehending some of these old, long-dead systems. When we manage to restore one of these sign-systems, we learn how the lost civilization that created it lived and developed. Usually, the way we go about this is by deciphering writings in forgotten scripts. The examples of this that come to my mind are ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics and the Linear B script, the latter of which was in use on the island of Crete around 1500–1200 BC. The deciphering of the Ancient Egyptian script, which was completed in 1822 by the French scholar Jean-François Champollion, was a major breakthrough in philology and culturology. Until that time, although ancient texts in Egyptian hieroglyphics abounded on stones, in pyramids, etc., the many efforts to decipher them had all failed, and they remained cryptic. Only after the Rosetta Stone was found, during the Napoleonic intervention in Egypt, was the script decoded. The stone text contained three versions of the same content: two in Egyptian hieroglyphs of different forms, and one in Greek translation. This made it possible to assemble all the earlier guesses about the meaning of the script, combine them with the new information gleaned from the Rosetta Stone, and present the results in a complete and well-reasoned form. This purely scientific venture became a worldwide sensation, because it revealed the whole ancient Egyptian civilization, in all the spheres of its history and with all its vicissitudes, to us all. The Linear B script was discovered by English archeologist Sir Arthur Evans at the beginning of the 20th century. During his excavations in Crete, he found a great many clay tablets that were inscribed in an unknown script. Sir Arthur called it Linear B script in reference to another script, called Linear A, which was also found in Crete and had not been deciphered at the time either.

Signs in their Pragmatic Aspect

137

In spite of all his efforts, Sir Arthur could not decipher the Linear B script. That breakthrough was made much later by another Englishman, Michael Ventris, who, when he was at school, heard a lecture by Evans about the script and its obstinate refusal to be decoded. Ventris collected all the previous work that had been done on the script, including about 180,000 cards with notations about Linear B, that were created over several years by Alice Kober, another scholar who had tried to decipher the script. Ventris also composed his own cards, which he ingeniously employed to help him decipher the script. He deduced that the script had been used to write a very early form of Greek, and that it was a kind of syllabic notation, in which each character represented a consonant and vowel combination ([bi], [ba], [bo], [bu], etc.). By looking for such combinations, he not only deciphered the script, but also extrapolated the pronunciation of the written words found in the texts he was working with. Ventris’ discovery was of great significance, both because it demonstrated that there was a Greek-speaking MinoanMycenaean culture on Crete, and because it showed that written Greek existed some 600 years earlier than what was thought at the time. For our purposes, it is also significant because it demonstrates a mode of cryptographic work which, to my mind, ought to belong to semiotics, at least in ventures like the decoding of Linear B.

In Sum In this chapter, I examined the ways in which signs and the human mind can cooperate in order to achieve significant results. In our discussions about signs, we tend to forget about this facet of sign construction and usage, and only discuss the ties between signs and their referents. This seems to be a grave blunder that we should try to avoid in the future.

CHAPTER NINE DEGREE OF ABSTRACTION IN SIGNS

I begin this chapter with a certain amount of trepidation, because the concepts it presents are, from beginning to end, my own invention and formulation. Originally, I developed the concept of degree of abstraction as the main criterion for my sign-system taxonomy. But, over time, it came to be my chief tool for the analysis of signs and their systems in general. In fact, in the course of my work, I found it to be useful in many other respects, and I have continued to apply it in many different situations. In this chapter, I will try to explain what I mean by the quality I call degree of abstraction and what its characteristics are.

Abstraction as “distance” from referents The quality of abstraction is purely pragmatic and can be understood intuitively. In general, we can say that the “closer” a sign is to its referent, the lower its degree of abstraction. The easiest way to explain this is to compare the degrees of abstraction in the various taxons of signs: natural signs, iconic signs, language signs, notational signs, and symbols. Natural signs are as close to their referents as signs can be, because they are simply parts of the things they represent. When we encounter a natural sign, our past experience of its referent enables us to reproduce the whole. If we hear thunder, we know that it means a storm will take place in the near future, and the location of the sound shows us the direction from which it will come. Thus, thunder is a natural sign, and it

Degree of Abstraction in Signs

139

has a very low degree of abstraction because it is as close as a sign can be to its referent – it is part of the storm it represents. Another example is the absence of people at a bus stop. This sign may mean that your bus has passed recently and you have to wait for the next one – most likely for a long while, to boot. Here, too, your previous experience tells you that the number of people waiting at a bus stop is an indicator of how long it is likely to take for the next bus to arrive. In this case the absence of signs (no people) is a sign for those waiting for a bus. An image of a thing is “further” from its referent, since it is not a part of the referent itself. Yet, it is still relatively close to its referent, because it resembles it in appearance or by conventional wisdom. With images, the popularity of a sign, the extent to which there is general agreement about its meaning, begins to play a role. The importance of this factor increases in weight as signs’ level of abstraction and distance from their referents grow. The importance of sign popularity is quite evident when you consider the next taxon, which consists of words and other linguistic signs. Words derive most of their connections to their referents from convention; in most cases, nothing but convention actually ties them with their referents. Why do English people use the word “table,” while Germans use “Tisch,” if not by sheer convention? Signs belonging to the next taxon, graphemes, are even more separate from the real-life things they signify. For example, the letters t-a-b-l-e only designate sounds that can be assembled into a meaningful word. Finally, symbols, whose meanings can vary depending on the purpose for which they are used, are the most abstract signs of all. Symbols are so far from the objects they designate, that we can easily sever them from their referents and

140

Chapter Nine

work with the signs instead of the objects themselves. In fact, symbols are constructed mainly for this purpose. The same tendency towards increasing abstraction can be observed in the developmental process of signs within a single sign-system. Even sign-systems whose signs have relatively low abstraction become more and more abstract in the course of their development; the newer a sign is in the system, the more distant it is likely to be from the object it designates. Thus, over time, very simple natural signs are complemented with more complicated and sophisticated ones. Consider, for example, the development of navigational sign-systems. In ancient times, people oriented themselves by stars that were visible only at night and only when the sky was cloudless. Then people invented the compass and the astrolabe, which brought newer, more abstract signs into the navigation signsystem. And nowadays we have added new tools that not only help us get our bearings, but also guide us towards our destinations. Similarly, painting, which is an iconic sign-system, has gradually progressed from the primitive paintings found in caves and children’s scribbles, to great composite pictorial art, and from there to abstractions with no visible resemblance to reality. In literature, which is a language sign-system, we see a similar movement from fairy tales and mythology to adventure stories, and then to realistic narrative. Today, our tastes in literature have progressed even further, and we prefer symbolic compositions. In mathematics, geometry was the first highly developed branch because geometric figures were borrowed from ontology. Then arithmetic, which was more abstract than geometry, came into existence. And only after that was algebraic calculation, which employs the most abstract designations, developed. We can see this same tendency – the gradual progression from less to more abstract signs – in every established

Degree of Abstraction in Signs

141

sign-system. In fact, we may even be able to use this standard path of development as a compass for investigating the histories of each of the sciences and how they expanded over time. From the moment I first conceived of the criterion of degree of abstraction, it seemed so obvious to me that I used it without any doubts. In the course of time, though, I began to feel that it needed some additional justification. After giving it further thought, I developed some new arguments, which I will present in the rest of this chapter.

A second gauge of the abstraction of signs There is another property of signs that also enables us to say that one sign is more abstract than another. I mentioned this property above, at the beginning of chapter 6,1 when I explained that a sign that has only one referent possesses a smaller degree of abstraction than a sign that has multiple referents. That is, by having more than one referent, a sign becomes more abstract. Imagine that you go to the social services and ask for assistance for your family. They want to know how many children belong to your family; and you either answer “I have one child,” or “I have three children.” It is clear that the second situation is more complicated, and assistance to a family with three children demands more effort and care. This complexity is a reflection of the greater degree of abstraction of the larger family group. Comparing the degrees of abstraction of multiple signs by estimating how many referents each one has is not by any means a precise way of calculating degrees of abstraction. It has a number of limitations: 1. The comparison can only be made between signs that belong to a single category. For example, a family with 1

See the discussion of figure 6-3 on page 81.

142

Chapter Nine

three children is more abstract than a family with one child. But a family with three children is not necessarily more abstract than a solar system with one planet. 2. Not all referents are equal in terms of how abstract they are. A sign with multitudes of referents that are not very abstract may itself be less abstract than a sign with fewer referents that are all highly abstract. Thus, a huge herd of animals is less abstract than a single object of cosmic proportions, because it presents fewer conceptual and operational problems. 3. A single sign may represent a number of objects that are very different from one another. In such cases, it is not clear how much weight should be given to each referent when we try to derive a number that is truly representative of how many referents the sign has. In an effort to avoid some of these problems, we can reformulate our principle in this way: the more diverse a signsystem is, the more abstract it is. Why are mathematical systems considered so highly reliable? Partly because they can be applied to any class of physical substances; that is, they are diverse. At the same time, of all the sign-systems, they use the most abstract signs. So, clearly, signs referring to multiple sign-systems must be thought of as the most abstract signs. In semiotic terms, we can say that the degree of abstraction in signs is something different from the number of referents a sign contains. In the next section, we will consider what exactly that something is.

What is the “degree of abstraction” of signs? I have no other way to answer this question than to refer to the notion “quantum of abstraction.” I do not know exactly what the essence of this notion is, but that does not prevent me from applying it. Many scientists have developed laws

Degree of Abstraction in Signs

143

that define the properties of entities whose essence was not known to them. Even the laws of gravity, which were formulated in a very clear manner by Newton, were conceived and successfully applied without anyone actually knowing the physical nature of gravitation itself. On the other hand, Newton gave his laws finite, quantitative formulations, and I cannot do the same for my notion of “degree of abstraction.” I can only rely on my intuition and on some visible clues that support my belief that it exists. I will now introduce one of them. Let us compare two games: chess and checkers. Both games can be presented as distinct sign-systems, each with its specific pieces (nomenclature signs) that have their own nominations, characteristics, and special rules governing their moves (syntax). What both games have in common is that they have exactly the same semiotic field and field fragments (64 squares), and that these fragments are arranged in the same pattern. What is the difference between the games? The difference lies in the number of pieces and their diversity. Checkers has 12 pieces for each side, all of which have the same weight in the game. Chess has 16 pieces for each side, and these pieces are divided into six categories, each category of which has its own algorithms of permissible moves and of how to capture the opponent’s pieces. In checkers, pieces only move diagonally, while in chess each category of piece has its own permissible moves and range of squares on which it can be placed on the board. The more diversified the permitted moves are, the greater the weight the piece possesses in the game. From this example, we can deduce some very important conclusions. The first is that chess has a more abstract signsystem than checkers, and its signs have greater quanta of abstraction. The quantum of abstraction in a sign-system depends on: a) the number of signs the system includes; b) the

144

Chapter Nine

diversity of categories of signs within the system; and c) the diversity of rules for manipulating each individual category of signs. Generalizing these conclusions even more, we can also deduce that, in the course of its mental development, humanity as a whole and each human being individually move from simpler signs and sign-systems to more complicated and abstract ones. As they gradually overcome the difficulties they encounter, people create new signs and sign-systems that include a) more coded entities, b) which are diversified into various classes and subclasses, c) where each class possesses its own rules of sign processing, and d) which themselves become more and more complex. We can also deduce that this process is perpetual and has no bounds, and that by inventing more and more abstract signs, people not only acquire more effective weapons for coping with different life situations, they also increase their mental capacity and power. The above can be illustrated with the history of money as a medium of exchange. In their search for such a medium, people went from very primitive to more and more complicated and abstract apparatuses. At first, they simply bartered things they possessed for other things that they wanted. Then they invented the idea of using a product that was widely available in their vicinities as a substitute for money (furs, salt, etc.). After that, they thought of utilizing precious metals for this purpose, and thus the first coins of various values were produced. More recently, people introduced paper money, which in and of itself was not worth anything, but whose value was guaranteed by a bank or a state (making money a kind of promissory note). Nowadays, we often do not use money as such, instead providing the number of a credit card that represents our account with the company that issued the card. The seller makes sure that the credit card company will pay the

Degree of Abstraction in Signs

145

value of the transaction, and then sells us what we wish to purchase. This is a good example of a universal and necessary activity that developed from simple and obvious signs into more and more distant and abstract ways of buying and selling. The same pattern of development from less to more abstract signs can be discerned in any branch of science and practical human activities.

The predominance of syntax in abstract systems Whereas in sign-systems with low abstraction, denotational signs are the most prevalent, in abstract systems, syntactic signs predominate. Syntax in natural sign-systems depends on the concrete circumstances at play when the algorithms of the system are used. When we orient ourselves by the stars, we can be interrupted by weather, by problems with the tools we are using, and by many other factors. None of these factors have any direct relation to the system itself, but they affect our observations of the signs interacting with one another. The same is true of iconic systems, although extraneous factors play a lesser role with them. These two types of signsystems are very close to ontology in their practical applications. In highly abstract systems, we are not at the mercy of factors like these. We can sit at our desks and work with the signs in accordance with the rules established in their metalanguages. The more abstract a system, the more rigidly its syntactic rules are formulated and the more strictly they must be obeyed. We freely deviate from the rules of sign manipulations in sign-systems of low abstraction without facing any serious consequences. But we are very careful not to lose our way in dealing with highly abstract systems – because we really have no other way of orienting ourselves than following the rules of its sign transformations. If we perform algebraic

146

Chapter Nine

transformations, but we digress from the rules of those transformations, we are destined to arrive at incorrect results. The necessity of following the transformation rules becomes more and more significant as the abstraction of the signs in the signsystems increases. In the most abstract systems, the ideal is to formulate such a strict chain of steps in the algorithm of action that they could even be followed by machines (in particular, by computers). And this is, in fact, what has actually been taking place recently; more and more tasks that were formerly performed by humans are now passed on to robots and computers for completion. Only the formulation of the algorithms themselves remains a purely human activity.

Predefined notation and abstract sign-systems In principle, sign-systems do not necessarily need systems of notation. In the history of human civilization, many very important systems did not possess them; and even in our time, systems of low abstraction do without notations (or they are optional). Thus, our everyday conduct is usually formulated in our minds without any predefined plan or by casually jotting plans in some kind of diary. Systems of notation were invented when existing sign-systems became too complicated for direct “manual” control, or when the absence of notation began to hamper the normal development of systems that had formerly existed without them. Music, languages, and many other systems were in use without any standardized notation for thousands of years. Only after people became aware that a fixed system of notation was necessary for further progress did they start to develop systematized notations. And, even then, many futile or partly successful attempts were required before the most acceptable notational solutions were achieved. Consider, for example, the history of writing systems, which were initially complex and

Degree of Abstraction in Signs

147

awkward, and gradually evolved to be much simpler and easier to use. The first and most obvious reason-d-étre of notation is to allow the dissemination of facts to others. Notation makes it possible to preserve information through time and space. Ultimately, this property of notation is what has enabled the creation of culture and semiotic reality as human institutions. Still, this is not the only reason for the creation and development of notations. Without the preliminary creation of a workable notation system, some very abstract sign-systems cannot be conceived at all. Their rules for processing signs cannot be formulated without using notational signs that are already set up and systemized. We can recite some literary compositions orally – all literary compositions were handled in this way before the invention of scripts – but large novels and sophisticated poems cannot be created without writing them down. People made primitive pictures of the territories surrounding them without formal charts; yet only after formal cartography evolved did the drawing of maps become not only an art, but also an advanced science that helped people find their ways in the most complicated situations. In short, the need for predefined systems of notation is a feature that clearly identifies sign-systems of a highly abstract character.

Different methods of verification I have already written about this above,2 so I will not repeat myself, but only reiterate that in systems with low abstraction, verification must be carried out after each step is performed, whereas systems with signs of high abstraction generally require postponed verification. Verification in the latter cases may be delayed for a very long time and may rely 2

See “Means of verifying sign processing,” page 38.

148

Chapter Nine

on a great deal of circumstantial evidence that is of an out-ofsystem character. Einstein’s theory of relativity was verified only after the solar eclipse of 1919, which made it possible to measure the deviation of light passing near the sun. Since the deviation predicted by Einstein occurred, it established the credibility of his theory. Had the eclipse taken place at a different date, the verification would have been moved to that date. This example shows two facts that are important for us. First, that however abstract and theoretical our propositions are, they should ultimately be validated in the ontological world. Otherwise, they will remain hypothetical. And secondly, that the sort of verification used in a specific sign-system may also be considered an indication of its degree of abstraction. A requirement for immediate verification affirms the low level of abstraction in a system, whereas its reliance on postponed verification attests to the high abstraction of its signs.

Visuality in signs Visuality in signs is quite different from visuality in ontological reality. In real-life circumstances, we generally understand and believe in what we see and perceive, and this is what is usually meant by visuality. But in semiotic reality, visuality refers to a variety of different kinds of signs – charts, diagrams, formulas, etc. Although signs also possess a kind of visuality that, in the long run, is reduced to sensual perceptions, these perceptions are not of a direct and immediate nature, as the visuality of ontological phenomena is. To arrive at the “visual” effects of signs, we have to jump over some preliminary hurdles: first, we have to know the meanings of the signs that are being used; then, we have to juxtapose these signs with the things they are encoding; and, finally, we must apply our conclusions to the material objects denoted by the signs. All three of these stages are of a cognitive nature, and

Degree of Abstraction in Signs

149

they are sometimes performed with the help of visual aids. When this is the case, different types of visuality are evident; professionals easily overcome these hurdles, but nonprofessionals, especially young ones, who have little practical background, may have to exert a great deal of effort to try to deal with them, and, even so, often have very little success. This is why all sign-systems possess specially devised mechanisms for what I call releasing the signs in use from excessive abstraction. These mechanisms are designed to present existing sign formulations either in a form that is more visually intuitive or through the results of empirical testing that brings the sign formulations closer to the objects and phenomena they designate. We will demonstrate this from the history of cartographic systems, which is a good choice both because it is a very patent example and also because of the revolution cartography is undergoing nowadays. Nonetheless, it is important to bear in mind that such mechanisms exist not only in cartography but in all abstract sign-systems, although their implementations vary from system to system. The aim of cartography is to help people orient themselves in space. When people first began developing methods for accomplishing this, they used visual signs: they oriented themselves by using what they saw around them (natural signs), by sketching the features of their surroundings (iconic signs), and by explanations employing gestures and speech (language and paralanguage signs). All of these signs were very visual, but they could only be used for orientation in people’s immediate surroundings. For long-distance orientation, as well as for teaching the younger generations, these signs were insufficient. Because of this, people invented charts of various sorts. Using them enabled orientation vis-à-vis the ground regardless of how far the location was from the user’s immediate surroundings. In addition, the charts facilitated searching for

150

Chapter Nine

objects on the earth, under it, and above it. As part of the process of developing these cartographic systems, people invented numerous conventional signs (that is, signs that are completely unlike the objects they designate); divided the surface of the Earth into parts based on parallels and meridians; and introduced a variety of other syntactical markings (like wind roses and scales) into charts and other cartographic devices3. Such signs have no immediate affinity to the things they denote, but they enable us to approach and investigate many objects that are otherwise beyond our grasps. To do this, we have to learn the meanings of the signs that are used in particular charts (this is the purpose of legends) and utilize this knowledge – initially for intellectual goals, but later also for manifold practical purposes. Our highly developed cartographic systems are a mandatory part of every grade-school curriculum in every country on the planet. Of late, satellites and other flying vehicles have allowed us to photograph the earth from a great distance, enabling us to see images of huge areas, and even the whole of our planet. A wide range of electronic gadgets can now make use of these technologies to create real-life pictures that simultaneously show our current locations and the points to which we want to go, as well as tracing our movements as we approach our destinations. This innovation has almost completely ousted the charts that people previously used for navigation, because it employs signs that closely resemble what we see with our own eyes. That is, it has a higher level of visuality than the older systems have. Millions of people have jumped at the opportunity to utilize this simple and easily readable means of orientation.

3

A detailed discussion of this topic can be found in Abraham Solomonick, Semiotics and Linguistics (Paris: Editions des Ecrivans, 2001), pp. 152 – 159.

Degree of Abstraction in Signs

151

These advances lead us to ask whether this innovation will cause humanity to stop using and generating the charts and other cartographic models whose invention and propagation took so much toil and effort from generations of humans. To this question, I answer emphatically that this is by no means the case. For the particular application that I described above, the new system will replace the established cartographic resources, but there will still be numerous cases in which conventional cartography will retain its former stature. Historical, economic, and meteorological maps, and scores of other kinds of charts, will remain in use, and the requirement to study this brilliant kind of human ingenuity will remain in place at schools and universities. When the calculator was invented and came into everyday use, it did not eliminate the study of arithmetic; on the contrary, the study of mathematics became all the more intensive. Cartography will surely follow a similar path.

Two qualities of signs that show their highly abstract nature Thus far, much of the discussion in this chapter has been concerned with properties of sign-systems that shed light on their degrees of abstraction. In the current section, I will dwell on two types of individual signs that also bear witness to the degree of abstraction of the sign-systems to which they belong. These two types of signs are compound signs (or “compounds”) and variable signs (or “variables”). Compounds – merged signs Signs in sign-systems are not fixed and unalterable; they constantly change, both in form and in meaning. Still, the extent of the changes signs undergo, and the innovations these changes engender, depend on many circumstances. One type

152

Chapter Nine

of change signs may meet with is the process I call signmerging. This process produces composite signs, which I call compounds. Merging of signs occurs in every sign-system, but the degree of merging depends on the degree of abstraction of the system: the greater the degree of abstraction, the higher the proportion of merged signs. In natural sign-systems, the signs usually retain their autonomous character in all circumstances. Moreover, at times we have no choice but to preserve their distinctiveness. For instance, in stamp and coin collections, the uniqueness of each item plays a special role. Even in spectral analysis (one of the most abstract natural sign-systems), specific combinations of spectrums tend to retain their established patterns, and it is these patterns that we use to identify the chemical elements represented in a sample. By contrast, the more abstract systems require compound signs and seek to produce new ones all the time. The reason for the birth of compounds is twofold. As I explained above4, compound signs expand the number of basic signs in a system, and they do this by adding new meanings that are clearly understandable at first glance to anyone familiar with the signs from which they are composed. There is, however, another reason for their appearance, and this one concerns the issue of sign abstraction. Increases in the abstraction of signs quickly overwhelm the ability of the average person to understand them. Our individual walks of life, and especially our immersion in specific activities, prevent us from being equally familiar with and competent in using all possible sign-systems. Over time, the best minds in particular fields of knowledge invent more and more specific signs – especially complex signs – and it would be unjust to require anyone to have a complete grasp of all the intricacies of the developments in every sign-system. 4

See page 117.

Degree of Abstraction in Signs

153

That is why we frequently hear laments about the fact that, since Leonardo da Vinci departed this world, humanity has ceased to produce Renaissance men. Leonardo was a genius, admittedly, but humanity today is not completely lacking individuals with similar brilliance. The crux of the matter is that since the Renaissance, the sciences have produced so many innovations and so many diversified methods of creating the signs related to them, that it is impossible to know them all with a high level of understanding. Thus it is that, at some stage, individual humans become helpless in their attempts to understand the full range of human knowledge. This forces some branches of science to present their achievements in an easily intelligible form. Processes of this kind also constitute the release of excessive abstraction.5 Many sciences create compounds for this reason – in order to overcome the excessive abstraction of their signs. Let us take algebraic formulas as an example. These formulas are created in order to facilitate the use of algebra by average people who are not able to cope with the basic signs of algebra without help. What would happen if we received the signs as they are – as individual Latin letters? We just wouldn’t know what to do with them. The only way to solve this problem is to present the signs as compounds in formulas and to train the users in implementing these formulas in different situations. The same thing happens with all formulas that describe aspects of the physical world. What would happen if we were given only the concrete figures for electric current – its voltage or the resistance of its conductor – if we are unaware of the formula that must be applied in order to make use of these values? In this situation, we would be unable to manipulate the numbers we had. We would be helpless even if we were given additional data about the characteristics of the current. 5

On the release of excessive abstraction, see also page 150.

154

Chapter Nine

We need the ingenuity of Ohm, who pinpointed the main features that define the current in any circuit, and invented the formula (that is, the compound sign) that was needed to work with them. Variables and their abstract nature Another, similar category of signs that demonstrate the abstraction of the sign-systems in which they are processed, are variable signs. We use these signs in algebra instead of numbers or in mathematical logic instead of other concrete nominations. These are signs that absolutely reject any connection to concrete substances. It is as if they say, “We are not you. We only represent you ex officio, but, in reality, we play our own game according to whichever rules we choose. When we get a result, we willingly hand it over to you, but not earlier. And then we disappear.” When people cannot reach any conclusions by means of other signs, they resort to variables and use them in accordance with very strict processing rules. These signs are the most abstract of all signs. In order to be focused on a single, but very significant, characteristic of the object being studied, variables are intentionally severed from any connotations related to the real world. This makes them the most important tools available for reaching the heart of a matter and doggedly following the process to the end. Once they have succeeded in doing this, they really do exit the scene, but they do not do so before this point. Even the verification of transformations involving variables is performed strictly within their own realm, without reference to anything from outside the system. Thus, the verification of transformations in the realm of mathematical logic is carried out by means of special verification tables that are included in the system. Furthermore, this form of verification only tells us whether our manipulations with the variables

Degree of Abstraction in Signs

155

were “right” or “wrong.” Note that this “rightness” or “wrongness” is not consistent with the notions of “rightness” and “wrongness” in the real world – it is simply formal approval or rejection of the way the signs were processed. Only after variables complete their work and transfer their conclusions to less abstract signs, does it become possible to begin the process of verification by the usual experimental methods. Let us illustrate this in a very simple but compelling example. In primary school, we solved very primitive arithmetic problems, and we had to follow some very strict rules when we did so. If we had values in different units, we had to convert them all to the same units before we could perform any operations on them. For example, if we had values in km., m., and cm., we had to convert all of them into one of those units (e.g., km.). Once the values were all in the same units, we had to drop the unit designation completely and perform arithmetic operations with the pure numbers alone. Finally, once we arrived at a final result, we had to reverse the process of dropping the units by returning the units to the result, and then, if necessary, converting the result into larger or smaller units (e.g., by converting 30,000 m. to 30 km.). What does this algorithm mean? It means that, in order to solve a concrete problem, we must first sever all the bonds connecting our data with reality, and enter an absolutely abstract realm. We should then work within this ethereal world until we arrive at a definite result, and then return the result to the world of real measurements. This, in a nutshell, is how the world of variables works, and, in a wider sense, how the world of abstract signs functions in general. Problems with releasing excessive abstraction While releasing excess abstraction is an important technique that sciences can utilize to help people make use of highly abstract systems, even if they do not fully understand

156

Chapter Nine

them, its employment is not without problems. Not all material is comprehended by all listeners or readers, even when it is reversed into code that is seemingly accessible and usually accepted. People are different in every sense, and some of them are more perceptive than others. In addition, the process is still dependent on the pedagogical abilities of those who explain the material to people who are less well-versed in the field. Successful instruction depends in part on the intuition both of the teacher and of the student. Still, the problem should be clear – you have to climb down from more abstract levels of signs to the levels that can be mastered by members of your audience. This idea is reflected in the illustration on the front cover of this book. On either side of the image of the pyramid of sign-systems, an arrow appears. The arrow on the left, which points up, represents the way people progress when they master new signs, moving up from the simple to the abstract. The arrow on the right, which points downward, represents the release of abstraction that takes place when people who have mastered abstract signs must simplify their knowledge in order to make it intelligible to other people.

PART III. ON SIGN-SYSTEMS

CHAPTER TEN WHAT EXACTLY IS A SIGN-SYSTEM?

What is a “system” in general? In Wikipedia, the general definition of a system is as follows: A system is a set of interacting or interdependent components forming an integrated whole or a set of elements (often called “components”) and relationships which are different from relationships of the set or its elements to other elements or sets. Fields that study the general properties of systems include systems in science, systems theory, systems engineering, cybernetics, dynamical systems, thermodynamics, complex systems and system analysis and design. They investigate the abstract properties of systems’ matter and organization, looking for concepts and principles that are independent 1 of domain, substance, type, or temporal scale.

Let us accept this definition as our preliminary working definition of systems in general. In its original form, this definition is inoperative and only brings to mind some abstract notions that do not provide the necessary characteristics on which we can build concrete systems of signs. In order to apply it to the practical realm of sign-systems, we must add two additional traits to the preliminary definition: 1

“System,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System; accessed February 2014.

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

159

1. Semiotic systems must work. That is, semiotic systems must use signs that, by nature and/or through their transformations, give us additional knowledge not only about the signs themselves, but also about their referents in ontological or semiotic reality. To achieve this end, we must also have a clear understanding of the purpose for which we are erecting a particular system of signs. 2. Semiotic systems must be constructed based on a predefined a priori principle. Every semiotic system is created in order to meet a practical human need Sign-systems appear when we need them to solve a practical or theoretical problem. Although they are sometimes employed in philosophical contexts, they primarily serve the practical needs of everyday life. It was very early in human history that people came to the realization that they needed tools for measuring distances and dimensions. That need was the stimulus for the invention of the first sign-systems and of the instruments required to apply those systems for measuring in real life. The first step in the development of the first sign-systems was when people enumerated from memory the things whose quantities they wanted to know. In the next step, instead of counting real objects, they employed material substitutes that they could count, using a one-to-one principle: their fingers and toes, pebbles, notches on sticks, etc. These were perhaps the first signs that were ever collected in systems. Later on, people came up with the concept of numbers and their relationships; it was at this point that modern systems of counting were brought into existence. Note that all peoples discovered the necessity of creating counting systems, but each group created its own system using its own ingenuity. Thus, before humanity as a whole

160

Chapter Ten

settled on a single counting system as the most efficient – and therefore the most acceptable – system, alternative counting systems were proposed and brought to fruition. Even though most of these counting systems did not ultimately prove to be the best, every one of the earlier systems was used in its time for practical purposes and thus satisfied human needs in real life. The same can be said regarding every sign-system that has ever been created: in its time, it met at least one of a wide variety of people’s needs – needs that grew out of their way of life at the time. In this sense, we can say that these signsystems worked. Every sign-system must have a leading principle Before you can begin creating a sign-system, you must define its leading principle. This principle identifies the purpose of the sign-system and gives some notion of the methods it will use to achieve that purpose. Let us take as an example the invention of writing. At first, people thought that they could communicate by means of drawing. They simply drew whatever they wanted to say. But drawing could only express a general and very ambiguous outline of what they wanted to say. Because of this, they invented hieroglyphs, which were vaguely reminiscent of the notions they were intended to convey, but were also severely limited. The last and most fruitful idea was alphabetic writing, which was based on the principle of representing the sounds that composed words with special letters. Behind all three of these sign-systems was a single leading principle: the idea that people should be able to communicate with one another in some written form. The best implementation of the principle – the one that best met the needs of the people who were the intended users of the system – is a tribute to human ingenuity and effort.

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

161

Defining the term “sign-system” At first glance, it seems clear that a sign-system is a system composed of signs. But this tautology is misleading and can lead us to a fallacy. Instead of this, let us approach the problem from a different angle: We can define the final product resulting from semiotic activity (semiosis) as a text. It may be a literary text, a musical text, or even a building, which can be viewed as an embodiment of an architectural text. Some scholars, especially literary critics, consider texts themselves to be signs. Indeed, from an author’s standpoint, this may even be correct – completing a text may constitute a significant event in the author’s biography, and, as such, may represent them in some way. But in more usual contexts, texts should not be considered signs; they are more like semiotic products, the results of manipulations of signs. Indeed, a single text may be analyzed differently depending on the purpose of the analysis. Imagine a written text composed of words. The text is like a semiotic field in which many distinct sign-systems can be found. Consider, for example a text that is a treatise on chemistry and contains chemical notations. To what category does this text belong, and which specialists should interpret it? Would they be chemists, or linguists, or semioticians? The answer is that each of these people could interpret the text, each one in their own right. The text could be approached from the point of view of chemistry, in which case it would be interpreted within the conceptual framework of chemistry, and it would constitute a chemical sign-system. It would be equally appropriate for this text to be appreciated as a linguistic one, or to be inspected from a semiotic standpoint. Only in the latter case would it be an object of semiotic scrutiny, and thus function as a semiotic sign-system. This leads me to one of the most troublesome discrepancies between my viewpoint and that of most of my colleagues in

162

Chapter Ten

the field of semiotics. My colleagues consider any text that was produced by letters as belonging to the semiotic realm and worthy of semiotic treatment. As a result, at the meetings in which we discuss semiotics, we enter into discussions of texts that have a wide variety of different qualities and express our “professional” judgment on them. This makes our work inefficient, because no one can be sufficiently proficient in all the diverse scientific topics that can be dealt with in texts to be able to analyze any and all texts they come across. Hence, a text executed in signs (and there is no other way of executing a text) should be approached through the conceptual framework of a specific science and only by specialists in that science. If a text is viewed through the prism of chemistry, it would be an object for deliberation by chemists. If it has linguistic attributes that are relevant to linguistics, these features would be discussed by linguists. Only if it possesses a significant semiotic conceptual aspect, would we – semioticians – step in. The problem is that we have not yet succeeded in defining what would constitute a specifically semiotic aspect of a text. The present book is one of the first steps in that direction. The first conclusion we can draw from what we have just said is that our starting premise – “a sign-system is a system composed of signs” – should be refined to read “a sign-system is a system composed of signs and dealt with in a semiotic framework.” The same system, presented from a different conceptual viewpoint, would be analyzed in another way and by other means. The second very prominent feature distinguishing signsystems is that they are systems of signs. This characteristic distinguishes them from systems that are composed of sign referents. There are millions of mechanical systems – automobiles, for example. There are legal systems like codes (criminal, civil, etc.), each of which is a collection of laws that

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

163

are gathered together in a book. What is the difference between sign-systems and mechanical or legal systems? Signsystems are all products of the human mind, each of which is intended to designate a large number of distinct items (ontological or semiotic ones) and is based on their specific characteristics. They do this by creating signs that can be dealt with as representatives of the things they designate, so that people can work with these signs instead of dealing with their real prototypes. That is, people bring the designations into their minds and work with them instead of working with the real items they represent. The ability of the human mind to work in this way – to change material objects into signs that represent those objects themselves along with all analogous objects – can be said to make us “symbolic creatures.” In addition, this process gives rise to all sorts of generalizations that do not exist in ontology. Since the same multitude of objects may be represented from various points of view, this process also leads to the creation of different sign-systems for the same collection of referents.

Classifying sign-systems Now that we have a working definition of the term “signsystem,” we can begin to consider how sign-systems should be classified. This is a very difficult problem, since there are vast numbers of different semiotic systems, and they were composed for extremely varied purposes and with numerous types of signs. We can suggest many different solutions to this problem, depending on an array of variables. Despite the problematic nature of this issue, I have decided to tackle it. The rest of this chapter contains a number of proposals for methods of classifying sign-systems. I realize that my choice of parameters is largely arbitrary and incomplete, and that these classifications most likely contain many inaccuracies. This is unavoidable, since this is the first attempt ever made to

164

Chapter Ten

cope with the problem. Nonetheless, it is worthwhile to pursue this process, because classification of sign-systems is necessary if the science of semiotics is to develop further. Main and secondary sign-systems One basic way to classify sign-systems is to distinguish between main and secondary sign-systems. Consider, for example, the type of sign-system I call a nomenclature. A nomenclature is a collection of names for a number of distinct objects whose natures are very similar to one another. In order to create a nomenclature, we must give names to all of the objects we want to include in the system; that is, we have to designate in the form of signs all the objects we will work with, when we make use of the sign-system. Nomenclatures serve as bases for creating other sign-systems, groups of similar signs that are subsets of the complete nomenclature. Mendeleev’s periodic table of elements is a prominent example of a nomenclature sign-system. It is a system in which we collect all the chemical elements of which we are aware. When Mendeleev first did this, the table included 63 elements; now, it comprises about 120. Nomenclatures are compiled according to some arbitrarily chosen criterion which seems important to the originator of the system. To Mendeleev, two things were important: showing the list of all the elements in order of their atomic weights, and simultaneously putting elements with common properties into distinct groups within the list (e.g., a group of metals, or a group of inert gases). He invented his table to serve both of these purposes. The arrangement of Mendeleev’s table enables us to study groups of metallic elements or inert gases separately, and we create special algorithms for manipulating the members of each group. This is an example of the invention of what I call secondary sign-systems. They are secondary because they have a subordinate role relative to the nomenclature system

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

165

that is their source. In secondary systems, we use the same names that are used in the nomenclatures on which they are based, but the specific qualities of the members of the secondary system are reflected in additional signs. Alphabets are also nomenclature systems, each of which is arranged in an arbitrary sequence. Many sign-systems are based on the alphabetic order of the national language most widely known among the inhabitants of the country in which they are compiled. Examples of such sign-systems are population censuses, dictionaries, military rostrums, and lists of pupils in classes. All of these are nomenclature systems that are constructed in alphabetic order in order to make it easier to find specific members of the groups. Sign-systems that are arranged in alphabetical order like this can be seen as secondary systems to the alphabets on which they are based. While the order of the letters in the alphabet is arbitrary, the alphabetical order used in these secondary systems is not at all arbitrary, which is why it helps us locate items in these lists. There is another variant of the relationship between main and secondary sign-systems. If the phenomenon under study is multifunctional, so that it has a number of prominent traits, each of these traits is studied by means of a discrete signsystem. Each of these latter sign-systems is a secondary system that has its own distinct sets of basic signs and algorithms for processing those signs. Thus, in linguistics there is a plane that we can call general linguistics, which has a conceptual foundation, basic signs (words), and algorithms. At the same time, linguists use special sign-systems for dealing with the semantic, phonetic, grammatical, and pragmatic aspects of individual concrete languages. In these secondary systems, every single semiotic characteristic is different, in principle, from the corresponding characteristic in the main system and in every one of its sister systems. (Admittedly, some basic

166

Chapter Ten

concepts are repeated in many secondary systems, but, in principle, they are different.) It is worthwhile noting that in such cases, in which multifunctional phenomena are being studied, the creators of the sign-systems often have to mentally construct logical frameworks that do not exist in real life. They must do this because it enables them to discuss the constructions and processes in the corresponding secondary systems. Thus, we imagine that whichever language we are currently dealing with possesses the same qualities as all concrete national languages, because otherwise we cannot discuss concrete languages and their properties; without identifying these common qualities, individual languages would appear completely unrelated. Similarly, we imagine that there are such things as general cartography, medicine, and chemistry, whereas such things do not actually exist in reality. This is a special contribution of semiotic reality to the construction of main and secondary signsystems. Classification based on the abstraction of basic signs We have already spoken about the classification, or rather, taxonomy, of sign-systems based on the level of abstraction of their basic signs. To illustrate this, I built a hierarchical construction with six consecutive levels (taxons), each of which grows out of the previous stages.2 Each higher step in this construction represents a higher degree of abstraction, in comparison with the preceding level. Thus, my diagram shows that natural signs give rise to images, which develop into words, graphemes, and symbols. (The symbols are divided into two levels, one for those with constant meanings, and the other for those with variable meanings.) Each subsequent 2

See the diagram on page 130, and the discussions on page 32 and in chapter 9.

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

167

taxon represents a more powerful type of sign – that is, signs that are less and less tied to their referents. This quality provides them with the potency to penetrate into the deepest and most fundamental properties of the things they signify. This is a good time to discuss classifications and taxonomies, and to explain why I distinguish between these two concepts. I view taxonomy as the initial, preliminary classification that is developed in any new sphere of knowledge. When a new sphere first appears, it is not usually brimming over with a great deal of concrete particulars and details. At this early stage, classifications are only just starting to appear. But the lack of available data gives the scientists involved in constructing the sphere a very narrow foundation on which to develop the classifications that they hope will prove to be useful in the future, as the new field develops. Because of this, the originators of new theories or sciences can only build taxonomies – broad, rough schemes of the classes and subclasses they predict will develop in their new fields over time. Thus, Charles Darwin’s theory of biological evolution (from which the notion of taxonomy penetrated into other sciences) was built on some theoretical presuppositions and incidental aspects of his own experience. His students quickly completed it, when they developed the mature theory of the evolution of living organisms. This expanded version of evolutionary theory extended from the simplest organisms to more and more developed and perfected creatures, up to and including Homo sapiens. The new theory included some way stations – stages of evolution, each of which had characteristic properties and was exemplified by specific types of living beings that were endowed with the qualities representative of the given stage. It was the representatives of these stages that they called taxons. The following generations of biologists began to seek these representatives in the real world and among excavated relics.

168

Chapter Ten

Sometimes the field work ended successfully; at other times, the initial suggestions were rejected or corrected. But this extensive work brought together a great deal of concrete facts that made it possible to build exact and well-founded classifications of the materials that were studied. These were real classifications; they were built along the lines of the proposed taxons, but they also amended them from time to time. In the same way, I have built my own taxonomies, based on the limited information currently available to me, with the intent that they will be further developed and modified over time until they ultimately become practical classifications. Classifications appear gradually and they do not replace taxonomies, but rather supply taxonomies with additional characteristics and details. Taxonomies include a limited number of classes, in chaotic and disorderly fashion; classifications are highly structured and coherent schemes. Furthermore, each class in a classification must incorporate only objects or properties that have the same origin and composition. In short, taxons show some presumed directions of future scientific investigation, while classifications contain the actual implementation and are based on facts that are already established. In the diagram below, I show how a taxonomy can be converted into a classification:

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

169

Sign-systems and their taxons (with language notations specified)

1

2

Natural systems – real things and phenomena

Iconic systems - images

Language notations

3

4

Languages words

With real objects

5

Pictorial

Hieroglyphics

Symbols

Variable symbols

Phonetic writing

writing

Alphabets

Syllabaries

There are more than one hundred alphabets collected in groups – and they are real classifications

Figure 10-1

On the highest level (1), you can see the central concept that gives rise to the entire process. There is no classification at this level, and taxons (2) characterize the signs in the most general way by comparing them with the signs of other taxons in different types of systems. Note that none of the squares in the diagram are figments of my imagination; all of them include real facts that were taken from external studies of various phenomena. The most interesting is the second level (3), which shows how the developments within the notational level occurred under the influence of all the other types of similar sign-systems. First, notations composed of concrete objects appeared (“with real objects”). A classic example of this is an olive branch, which to this day is a token of peace. Next, images that looked like gestures (e.g., of greeting, grief, or triumph) or cartographic

170

Chapter Ten

notations, came into use (“pictorial writing”). These were followed by the notations used to write the words of oral languages (“hieroglyphics,” and “phonetic writing”), and the fixed and variable symbols employed in mathematical or other formal systems. The entire process bears witness to the fact that changes in sign-systems occur not only in an upward direction (from a lower level to more abstract levels), but also horizontally – within one level, when signs of the same type become more and more abstract. Of all the possible extensions I could have included in the diagram, I chose to only include the linguistic ones (3-4), and from then on, only the alphabetic notations (5). My aim was to show how each layer in the process comprises less and less taxonomic features and acquires more of the properties of pure classifications. The process is lengthy, but consistent, and ends with layers of homogeneous signs. Whereas taxonomic layers include signs that have mixed natures, classifications tend to only include signs that share a content type and degree of abstractness. Classification based on the development of individual signs The basic signs of a sign-system, regardless of the type of system, do not retain their level of abstraction eternally. Rather, they are always “maturing” by becoming more and more abstract. Thus, for example, pictures – iconic signs – developed over time from being extremely primitive to being more and more realistic; whereas the earliest pictures only contained images representing single items, they gradually came to be more compositionally complex. To this day, this process has continued, as pictures have gone from being exclusively realistic and true-to-life to being more and more abstract in their representation. Despite this, the underlying nature of all of these variations of pictures remains image signs. The whole

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

171

of the history of drawing can be presented as developing along these lines, and all written histories of drawing and painting are composed in this way. In a similar way, signs in the history of the medical profession can also be represented as continuously “maturing” – as constantly gaining abstractness. The same phenomenon is easily detectable in the progressive development of chemical, architectural, and biological signs, as well as in many other types of signs. The same process is also evident in the gradual changes that take place in the basic signs of all linguistic systems, i.e. in their words. Even within a single modern language, one can observe how words of different abstractness compete with one another and take on different roles as the language matures and changes. This type of analysis provides us with a unique opportunity to study the dynamics of change in linguistic systems in a way that is never given proper consideration in purely linguistic works. I contend that, during the development of every language, the first level of word germination and rooting within the system consists of proper names. After these, each language begins to develop words for notions (embracing all relative objects, qualities, and actions), which are then followed by concepts (in their terminological and scientific sense). Each layer of words is built on the basis of the previous layer, with a higher level of abstraction. In fact, this was my guiding principle when I wrote my book, Semiotics and Linguistics.3 This approach seems to have been a success, because it led to new and unexpected results that were not obvious in traditional linguistic studies. There is no doubt that the same kind of analysis can be fruitfully applied to other sciences. In short, abstraction may become the chief operational criterion in semiotic investigations. 3

Abraham Solomonick, Semiotics and Linguistics (Paris: Editions des Ecrivains, 2001).

172

Chapter Ten

Classification based on the depth of syntactic ties This form of classification is based on the strength of the syntactic bonds (ties) among the signs in a particular system. The ties may be very loose, connecting the signs in one amorphous whole by a number of arbitrary characteristics, or they may be very strict and rigid, placing signs in specific positions and dictating that a change in the position of a single sign affects all the other signs in the system. Between these extremes, there are several intermediate levels of syntactic strength and depth, which I call aggregate states of signsystems. This approach is very novel, and I cannot claim to have thought it through in full detail. Because of this, my presentation of it here is rather superficial, especially when it concerns the intermediate aggregate positions. Nevertheless, one point is clear: signs that are more abstract demand that their systems have a more rigid and stronger syntax. Thus, this classification is tightly connected with the previous one. On the other hand, this classification deals with all of the kinds of signs mentioned above – natural signs, images, words, hieroglyphs, and mathematical signs. So, from this point of view, it is cross-sectional. The lower levels in this classification are readily identifiable. At the lowest level are sign-systems whose signs are gathered together temporarily for a practical purpose. Typically, these systems are created for the purpose of naming and particularizing specific items among a larger group of things that have the same designation. As an example, consider the systems of names that are commonly employed in human communities (first names, patronymics, and family names). In principle, the community possesses a collection of names that is as large as the number of people in the community. Adding an additional name, or removing an existing name, does not affect any of the other names in the system.

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

173

Furthermore, you can call as many people “Peter” as you like. Neither are you limited (in most countries) to choosing names that belong to the established name system in your community. Although many traditional restrictions exist, you are not obliged to follow them. The only aim of naming is to single out the bearer of the name so that he or she can be identified easily and found when wanted. When I employ a classification system based on the depth of syntactic bonds, I describe systems such as this one as having the weakest aggregate state: neither the presence nor absence of a sign, nor changes to an existing sign, influence any of the other signs in the system. The next levels in this classification evolve as a function of the additional aims of different types of sign-systems. If the systems are used not only to designate the referents of the signs but also to group them or to process them using particular rules of transformation, they belong to a class of systems with stronger syntactic ties. Tentatively, we may call them systems with intermediate rigidity of syntax or systems of intermediate aggregate states. Very many systems of this type exist. The following examples of systems are listed in order based on the depth of their syntactic ties, which increases from one to the next: 1. Telephone numbers: The obvious reason for the existence of a system of telephone numbers is to designate each telephone with a specific number so that it can be found when it is needed. For this very reason, you cannot give identical numbers to two different phones, as you could give identical names to two people in the list of names discussed above. If you do want to give the same number to more than one client, you have to add additional components, like area codes. These supplementary codes endow the original number with additional syntactic bonds. In comparison with the list of

174

Chapter Ten

names, these syntactic bonds complicate the system, putting it into a higher aggregate state. 2. Alphabetical order of entries in dictionaries: As with the previous sign-systems, the main aim of a dictionary is to make it possible to find items and their definitions easily. For this purpose, we employ alphabets, which are sign-systems whose signs are placed in a very rigid, predefined order. In my framework, alphabets constitute closed systems (as compared with open systems – see page 176 below) that contain fixed collections of signs in a fixed order. Alphabetical order enables us to find the item we want very quickly, no matter how large the dictionary is. Deviation from this rule makes the task of finding an item much more baffling. For instance, in dictionaries of idioms, where you cannot be sure which word in an idiom to use as the leading word, it is frequently very difficult to find a specific phrase when you search for it. 3. Dewey Decimal system: This system of bibliographical classification of printed works uses numerical and alphabetic systems that are formally structured and rigid to divide publications into fixed categories. The system is based on the division of knowledge into categories, each of which has a fixed position and number in the sign (label) attached to a given printed text. Additional properties, such as the type of publication, are also indicated in the sign by a specific notation. All of this makes the syntax of the system, and the connections between the separate signs within it, much more complicated and strict than in the systems that have lower aggregate states. The higher levels of this classification contain systems with increasingly rigid syntactic rules that give less freedom

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

175

for manipulating the signs they include as independent units. In these rigid systems, when you change the weight of even one sign, you indirectly change the meanings of all the other signs. The most extreme manifestation of this is a formula, in which the signs are completely dependent on one another. When you change the value of one element of the formula, you change its overall result. I call this situation the highest aggregate state of sign-systems. In the process of classifying sign-systems based on their syntactic bonds, we can investigate not only the strength of the bonds but also their types. For example, we can divide syntactic bonds into those that use separate units and those that use comprehensive logical schemes. Thus, in chemical notations, coefficients, plus signs, equals signs, etc., are used to indicate syntax. Each of these signs is a separate unit; together they constitute a scheme for composing equations that represent chemical reactions. In language notations, indents, capital letters, and so on, serve the same purpose; individually, they are separate syntactic marks, but large portions of what we call text are united by means of such syntactic marks, because they belong to broad comprehensive syntactic schemes. Identifying and investigating the various types of syntactic bonds is a matter for much more detailed and deep consideration than can be undertaken in this book. In our context, it is sufficient to note that all syntactic ties and connections are deeply integrated into sign-systems. They can be developed in one type of system and then copied by others, but they can also evolve and mature within individual sign-systems. Classification based on the objectives of the system This classification of sign-systems is tightly connected with the previous one (the aggregate state of a system), but it approaches the issue from another angle. As I explained

176

Chapter Ten

above, if the objective of a system is merely to give names to referents, the system has the weakest state of aggregate signs. By contrast, building a system whose objective is to make it possible to find a specific referent by means of its name complicates both the system itself and its methods of operation. If the objectives of the system include processing the signs in the system in order to arrive at new results that are not yet known in ontological or semiotic reality, the system must have yet more elaborate aggregate states. Regarding this last type of objectives, I would like to distinguish between what I see as two different categories of sign-systems. We may use a sign-system to help us find things that are not as yet known, but nevertheless do already exist in reality, or we may use it to create entirely new things that are purely the inventions of our human imaginations. Discovering new chemical elements with the help of Mendeleev’s periodic system is one thing; applying the laws of electricity to invent dynamo-machines is quite another. In both situations, we achieve our goals with the help of sign-systems, but in each case the system must be built differently. To make these differences clear is the task of semioticians. Differentiating between open and closed sign-systems Although the distinction between open and closed systems has been discussed extensively in scientific literature, it has only been applied to ontological systems, which differ greatly from sign-systems. Ontological systems relate exclusively to ontological reality, which exists almost entirely independently of humans. By contrast, sign-systems are human inventions. Because they are man-made, people carefully design and constantly improve both open and closed sign-systems. Alphabets of natural languages are specifically constructed as closed systems with fixed positions for each letter. This design pays off in dictionaries and other devices that are founded on these

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

177

closed systems. Languages, on the other hand, are open systems that can absorb and remove as many word-units as necessary. This openness reflects the essence of language systems, since languages were invented to reflect all the things we encounter in our lives. The main property that is used to distinguish between open and closed ontological systems is entropy, which is a measure of disorder and chaos in the system. Karl Ludwig von Bertalanffy, one of the founders of general system theory, declared that in physical systems, which are closed, the entropy of the system increases. Biological systems, by contrast, are open, and their entropy gives them a tendency to constantly expand.4 I contend that in all sign-systems, entropy is reduced as we use and improve the system. As designers of systems, we are greatly interested in ensuring that our systems contain as little uncertainty as possible. Because of this, we constantly work to improve our systems by minimizing the uncertainty they entail. This is true in both open and closed sign-systems. Thus, the entropy of each sign-system is constantly diminishing. In other words, the quality of the system and its effectiveness are always on the increase. Closed sign-systems can themselves be divided into two large groups: those whose signs are in a fixed order, and those whose signs are not. Alphabets and calendars are examples of the first category. The legends of geographic maps are examples of closed systems that contain a fixed group of signs – those that are used in the map, – but their order is not usually fixed. Incidentally, in geographic maps we must distinguish between two kinds of sign-systems: that of the designated objects represented in the map (this is the open system) and the legend of the map, which is a system of the second order (see the next section) and hence closed. 4

Ludwig von Bertalanfy, General System Theory (New York: George Braziller, 1968).

178

Chapter Ten

First, second, and higher order systems Sign-systems can also be classified by their order. Systems of the first or immediate order usually have referents in the ontological world. For example, language systems of the first order register all the words in the language and classify them according to linguistic criteria. Language systems of this sort were in use for a thousand years before people developed fixed notations for writing them down. The notations they ultimately developed may be considered systems of the second order with respect to the original referents, because their referents are words, which are first-order signs. Systems of notation can themselves take on different attires, such as Morse code for telegraphic communication, Braille for blind readers, and sign language for the deaf, all of which represent the letters in the second-order system of notation. These latter systems are third order systems for transmitting the same messages that can be transmitted orally. The same type of classification can be applied to other sign-systems. For example, consider chemical sign-systems. The periodic table is a first-order system and includes all of the elements that are known at the moment. Chemical reactions are written down with the help of second-order signsystems that are based on the first-order one. Regardless of whether they use linear, circular, or hetero-circular notations (each of which has its own system of syntactic bonds), all of these second order systems of notation comprise only those elements that were already included in the periodic table. Second-order and higher-order sign-systems may use the same signs as those used in the corresponding first-order system, as they do in chemistry, or they may use different signs, like alphabets that use letters (or hieroglyphs) instead of words as their basic units. In the latter case, the use of a different set of signs raises the system to a higher level of ab-

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

179

straction. Thus, the alphabetic system of notation has a higher level of abstraction than the language system itself. It is worth mentioning at this point that, as a rule, open sign-systems are usually of the first order, whereas closed ones are usually of the second or higher order. Planned and unplanned systems In the history of human civilization, there have been many sign-systems that came into existence in order to satisfy an urgent human need and, as a result, developed chaotically. The first examples that come to mind are languages and counting systems. Languages developed because people had to designate things, to name them and to refer to them by their names instead of interacting directly with them. There has never been a community of people on the earth that did not invent a language of its own to serve this purpose. Initially, none of these systems was properly organized so that it could function satisfactorily. That is, the new languages could not function on their own, relying exclusively on their internal resources without any external help (from mime, gestures, and acting). Little by little, the entropy of each language decreased and its degree of sophistication increased. The primary catalyst of these changes was the invention of grammar. Nowadays, the bulk of extant languages have reached a degree of sophistication that allows them to express the subtlest ideas in the most expressive ways without assistance from outside the system. The history of arithmetic also shows chaotic development. A vast diversity of counting systems was invented by different communities, including the Mesopotamian, Incan, and Egyptian systems, to mention just a few. The Arabic system (which is actually Indian in origin) displaced them all, because it was seen to be the most effective and functional. The global adop-

180

Chapter Ten

tion of this system took place over many centuries, but nowadays the system reigns uncontested. These systems can be contrasted with systems that were methodically constructed based on a predefined plan. Examples of such systems are the system of syllogistic logic invented by Aristotle, and Esperanto, an artificial language composed by Ludwik Lazarus Zamenhof in accordance with a preconceived pattern. Planned systems are improved by further development based on the principles that lay at their foundation from the outset. By contrast, in systems that developed chaotically, the main task is to streamline them in accordance with newly suggested and often impromptu ideas. In both cases, improvement is necessary, but its method of implementation depends on the way the systems came into existence. From the time of its inception, Esperanto has been in the process of being reformed, but the reforms always follow the principles its inventor used when he created it. All attempts to deviate from these foundations failed, because the resistance from the guiding principles was too great. In natural languages, on the other hand, the guiding principles of each language also play a decisive role, but they are adjusted to suit the particular structure of each concrete language. Consider modern Hebrew, for example: its grammar is based on verb roots that have three consonants, an attribute that stands it in contrast to many European languages. Nevertheless, this distinctive feature is mitigated by the syntactic relationships between the elements of a complete sentence. These relationships – subject and predicate, passive and active, causative, etc. – are common to all modern languages, including Hebrew. Regardless of their distinct principles, in the long run, every language becomes well-equipped to cope with all sorts of meanings.

What Exactly Is a Sign-System?

181

Sign-systems of particular and of general implementation The last type of classification I am positing distinguishes between particular systems – systems that belong to specific fields of endeavor and are only used to investigate ontological reality related to those fields, and general systems – systems that can be applied in a variety of contexts and can serve as analytical foundations in these areas. Let us take cosmological theories as an illustration of this distinction. It is well known that, in the course of human history, many cosmological theories have been propounded. In fact, every human community has had its own conception of how the universe came into existence and how it is constructed. Many of these conceptions are based on beliefs and myths; in fact, cosmological theories of this sort have remained influential in many communities to this day. Nevertheless, theories grounded on practical observation and on calculations based on observed phenomena have also emerged. Observation led, in the long run, to a variety of models explaining the existence of our universe. All of these models are particular to this concrete purpose. That is, these models are sign-systems that are only useful in one context – cosmology. On the other hand, the calculations that were performed on the data that was analyzed generally relied on mathematical sign-systems that are useful for any quantitative assessment. Just as mathematical sign-systems serve as tools that can be used by any system that requires quantitative assessment, languages are general systems that can be used to represent other systems that originate in a wide range of fields. Only through language can we disseminate an idea by presenting it as a series of thoughts, and only by the logic that is embedded within languages can we manage to express these thoughts cogently and persuasively. An outstanding semiotician of the last century, Emile Benveniste, wrote in this regard that “lan-

182

Chapter Ten

guage is the interpreting system of all other systems, linguistic and non-linguistic.”5 The above classifications of sign-systems can be broadened to include more classes. Two examples of additional classes that could be included are concrete sign-systems and metalinguistic sign-systems. Concrete sign-systems are signsystems that are inseparably connected to specific ontological phenomena and are developed only in response to them. Metalinguistic sign-systems develop to meet the internal requirements of the sign-systems they grow out of; examples of possible systems in this class would be “pure mathematics” or “pure linguistics.” Whether metalinguistic systems ultimately can be used in concrete sign-systems depends on a variety of circumstances, but these circumstances are not the reasons for the initial development of the metalinguistic systems. These, then, are the classifications of different sign-systems I have compiled so far. As far as I know, this is the first attempt to describe and catalogue classifications of signsystems. Even in the course of writing this chapter, I improved my approach and its implications. I am convinced that other classification schemes can be proposed, and they may well be more convincing and/or more compatible with their components than mine are. My purpose in this presentation is only to initiate the discussion of such schemes in order to further the field of semiotics, as distinct from all other scientific discourse.

5

Robert E. Innis (ed.), Semiotics: An Introductory Reader (London: Hutchinson, 1986). Cited in: Daniel Chandler, Semiotics for Beginners (Introduction). http://visual-memory.co.uk/daniel/Documents /S4B/; accessed March, 2015.

CHAPTER ELEVEN THE LOGIC OF CREATING AND PROCESSING SIGN-SYSTEMS

I understand logic as a method for dealing properly and coherently, both with any practical endeavor and also with all kinds of mental activities. Every course of action has its own kind of logic; some even have several forms of logic, for different purposes. The same is true of the realm of semiotics: every sign-system possesses a specific kind of logic that governs its processing. Even so, all sign-systems also share a particular kind of logic, a logic that is an outgrowth of their belonging to semiotic reality. This sort of logic is endemic to all sign-systems, inasmuch as they are constructed of the same “material.” This chapter is devoted to this specific kind of logic, the logic for managing semiotic substances.

The search for appropriate signs for new systems The search for appropriate signs was the first stage in the process of man’s becoming a symbolic creature. It is also our first task when we encounter a new and unfamiliar situation. In this regard, it can be said, we behave like any other animal. When a cat finds itself in new surroundings, it begins to smell all the things around it in order to familiarize itself with them. The same is true of humans; when we find ourselves in a new situation, we try to familiarize ourselves with it by looking for obvious features – that is, for signs. But when we select signs to use for orientation, we go much further than any animal,

184

Chapter Eleven

because we have a much greater intellectual capacity for performing this task. Searching for proper signs becomes second nature to us in our normal lives. It also becomes a professional habit for those who must frequently cope with new and dangerous situations: pathfinders, detectives, and the like. The Pathfinder, Sherlock Holmes, Hercule Poirot, and thousands of other heroes are famous, first of all, for their ability to quickly find the signs that are clues for deciphering mysteries and secrets. The signs we discover must be clearly understandable in order for them to lead us to their practical applications; otherwise, they cannot serve as clues. Yet, in some situations, signs exist that do not possess any particular venue. For example, a portrait remains a sign even though it does not lead us to any knowledge of who it is meant to represent, what its history is, and who created it. Still, it may also be valued from an esthetic point of view – that is, it is valued as an object of semiotic reality. The search for signs can be long and arduous, but finding new kinds of signs always opens new vistas for furthering scientific investigations. This point becomes clear when you think about Alexander Butlerov’s structural formulas or August Kekulé’s discovery of the structure of benzyl molecules, whose atoms are connected to one another by double bonds. Investigations of these kinds lead us from single signs, however complicated they may be, to systemic ones and to their combinations. But before I discuss this, let me first discuss another role of some single signs, that of serving as taxons.

The Logic of Creating and Processing Sign-Systems

185

Signs as taxons in scientific theories I spoke of taxons in detail in the previous chapter.1 I am coming back to them now to show how the taxon concept can relate to certain single signs, signs that fill a much more important role than those described above. When someone introduces a new general theory, he must give some explanation of how the theory is expected to evolve – what the pivotal turning points will be as it develops further. These significant points, representing bodies of knowledge that are not yet known, are themselves signs – signs that are taxons, exemplifying the most striking characteristics of the signs that will later form the body of the theory. If the theory is accepted as a paradigm for further research in the field, these taxons will be an essential part of it, and will remain the focal points of the theory throughout its development. One example of this scenario is Darwin’s theory of the development of species. To this day, the taxons Darwin and his adherents chose as intermediate stages for the theory of evolution continue to serve as touchstones for the approval or rejection of any new discovery in the field. Other theories of large scale development (geological or climate changes, for instance) can also serve as examples. In fact, I myself proposed something of this kind when I introduced my theory of semiotic development and identified the taxons that I believe are, or should be, the main focal points of semiotic research.

Predictive power of sign-systems Sign-systems are much more powerful predictors than single signs. They allow us to formulate algorithms for dealing with special kinds of situations and, once these algorithms are 1

See “Classification based on the abstraction of basic signs,” page 168.

186

Chapter Eleven

tested, to apply them in ontology. This is true of spatial and temporal relations, periodic processes, and many other things. If, for example, we want to know what time sunrise will be tomorrow, we analyze the relevant data about the movements of celestial bodies and derive the required information. To do this, we usually use the standard mathematical procedures and formulas that were developed for this purpose, and insert the relevant concrete values. Similarly, if we want to be able to know the speed at which a car is traveling, we prepare a special tool that uses the appropriate algorithms to calculate the speed when we enter the relevant information into it. The most striking feature in this process is that we can sometimes manage to get to the correct results without even knowing the physical substance of the process itself. In fact, this seems to be the rule rather than the exception. When Newton deduced his laws of gravity, he did so without knowing what physical processes were behind them. We do not even know them now. When Faraday empirically studied electricity and formulated the laws of its behavior, he did not know anything about the essence of electric current and its components. His conclusions were applied in practice and changed our lives, and still people had no inkling of the real processes that were taking place within the electromagnetic fields. Only much later were the structures of atoms and of their particles discovered, so that the real substance of electrical currents could be identified. Some people say that if it is sufficient to know the outcome of an event, there is no need to know the real essence of the event, as long as we know that it really takes place and produces the necessary effect. There is even the facetious expression to this end: “One can draw a straight line without knowing that it consists of dots.” Others are ready to dedicate their lives to trying to discover how and why things happen as they do. And because of people like these, the process of innova-

The Logic of Creating and Processing Sign-Systems

187

tion goes on and on – as a result of scientific enthusiasm and inquisitiveness. But we must not forget that all this proceeds with the help of signs and sign-systems, and in the realm of semiotic reality.

Types of logic used with sign-systems The creation and use of sign-systems are processes that proceed in accordance with certain logical patterns. I have identified four types of logic that are applied during these processes. I will describe these four types in the next sections. Before I begin, I want to point out that all four of these types of logic are present when we are working with any kind of sign-system. Furthermore, if anything goes wrong when we are using a sign-system, we must ask ourselves not only, “What have we done that was illogical?,” but also, “Which kind of logic have we failed to apply correctly?” We should seek an answer to the first question within the realm of the type of logic we have not applied properly. Matching logic The first kind of logic I have identified is the logic of matching a picture of something that is designated in a signsystem with a picture depicting the actual events that occur outside the system. This is the coveted aim of every signsystem: to present a picture of what we want to know about as clearly and accurately as possible. If the picture is true to life, we can predict the future dynamics of events, and possibly even change the reality to our satisfaction or prevent any objectionable results we have predicted from taking place in reality. It is not easy to arrive at a picture that is so true to life, but we do everything in our power to realize this objective. Consider, for example, one of the most wonderful discoveries of our time: the genetic code. The actual investigation began

188

Chapter Eleven

about one hundred years ago. Many bright minds worked diligently to gain insight into the workings of the inheritance process until they finally attained a clear understanding of it. The investigative process culminated in the deciphering of the human genome. A glimpse of the sign-system which is called the genetic code shows it to be very enlightening. First of all, it exemplifies the whole gamut of syntactic levels. To begin with, we can posit that its morphological level consists of only four bases (A, G, C, and T). In this case, its codons represent the syntagmatic level, its amino acids constitute its sentence level, and the whole code is the text level of the syntactic ties within the system. Here is a succinct description of the code structure retrieved from the Internet. Readers who do not like abstract texts need not be wary of it – it is quite simple and instructive, explaining the code by comparing it with common languages that are familiar to everybody. The Genetic Code It has been mentioned in a variety of modules that DNA stores genetic information. That much was clear from the experiments of Avery, Macleod, and McCarty and Hershey and Chase. However, these experiments did not explain how DNA stores genetic information. Elucidation of the structure of DNA by Watson and Crick did not offer an obvious explanation of how the information might be stored. DNA was constructed from nucleotides containing only four possible bases (A, G, C, and T). The big question was: how do you code for all of the traits of an organism using only a four letter alphabet? The information stored in DNA is ultimately transferred to protein, which is what gives cells and tissues their particular properties. Proteins are linear chains of amino acids, and there are 20 amino acids found in proteins. So the real ques-

The Logic of Creating and Processing Sign-Systems

189

tion becomes: how does a four letter alphabet code for all possible combinations of 20 amino acids? By constructing multi-letter "words" out of the four letters in the alphabet, it is possible to code for all of the amino acids. Specifically, it is possible to make 64 different three letter words from just the four letters of the genetic alphabet, which covers the 20 amino acids easily. This kind of reasoning led to the proposal of a triplet genetic code. Experiments involving in vitro translation of short synthetic RNAs eventually confirmed that the genetic code is indeed a triplet code. The three-letter "words" of the genetic code are known as codons. This experimental approach was also used to work out the relationship between individual codons and the various amino acids. After this "cracking" of the genetic code, several properties of the genetic code became apparent: x

x

x

x x

The genetic code is composed of nucleotide triplets. In other words, three nucleotides in mRNA (a codon) specify one amino acid in a protein. The code is non-overlapping. This means that successive triplets are read in order. Each nucleotide is part of only one triplet codon. The genetic code is unambiguous. Each codon specifies a particular amino acid, and only one amino acid. In other words, the codon ACG codes for the amino acid threonine, and only threonine. The genetic code is degenerate. In contrast, each amino acid can be specified by more than one codon. The code is nearly universal. Almost all organisms in nature (from bacteria to humans) use exactly the same genetic code. The rare exceptions include some

190

Chapter Eleven

changes in the code in mitochondria, and in a few 2 protozoan species.

It is not by chance that the genetic code is compared with natural languages; many biologists believe that it is really a language. But this may be only partially true, and only as a figure of speech. Languages cannot exist with only four “letters” and a few scores of “words.” The signs of the genetic code are much more abstract than letters in languages. They are also much more informative than letters, and the “rules” for using them are much more rigid (as it says above, “the genetic code is unambiguous”). The only thing they are actually able to do is to represent 20 amino acids which themselves are used to construct whole genetic texts. That is why the system is called a code and not a genetic language. Another reason I felt it was illuminating to consider this example is that it describes the entire process of creating a successful sign-system, beginning with the ceaseless, continuous work in which thousands of microbiologists during the last century proceeded, one after another, to work on the same task, which was to find the correct picture of the genetic code. Ultimately, the outcome of all of this arduous work was that the researchers found the complete and correct picture they sought, in which the matching logic between the genetic process in ontology and the genetic code describing it in semiotic reality is perfect. Formal logic Formal logic is the oldest type of logic invented by humans. The original creator of formal logic was Aristotle (4th century BC). It was Aristotle who taught us how to come 2

“The Genetic Code,” http://biolabs.wikispaces.com/The+Genetic +Code; accessed March 2015.

The Logic of Creating and Processing Sign-Systems

191

to a correct conclusion from a set of well-chosen premises. In so doing, he was describing the usual way our thinking processes proceed – how we progress from one assertion to another in when we deliberate about an issue. Gottfried Leibniz considered the invention of syllogisms “one of the most wonderful and significant revelations of the human mind.” And Immanuel Kant wrote that “Aristotle’s logic did not retreat from his time a single step back.” Formal logic is used in every mental act, including all applications of sign-systems. Yet Aristotle’s logic is not sufficient to ensure correct thinking. We also have to know how to construct a whole text out of correct assumptions. For this we can turn to Rene Descartes. In his Discourse on the Method (1637), Descartes lays out four rules of thought that are meant to ensure that our knowledge rests upon a firm foundation. These are the rules: The first was never to accept anything for true which I did not clearly know to be such; that is to say, carefully to avoid precipitancy and prejudice, and to comprise nothing more in my judgment, than what was presented to my mind so clearly and distinctly as to exclude all ground of doubt. The second, to divide each of the difficulties under examination into as many parts as possible, and as might be necessary for its adequate solution. The third, to conduct my thoughts in such order that, by commencing with objects the simplest and easiest to know. I might ascend by little and little, and, as it were, step by step, to the knowledge of the more complex; assigning in thought a certain order even to those objects which in their own nature do not stand in a relation of antecedence and sequence.

192

Chapter Eleven

And the last, in every case to make enumerations so complete, and reviews so general that I might be assured that 3 nothing was omitted.

Logic of the sign-system In addition to the types of logic I described above, there is also the internal logic of each sign-system. When we work with a sign-system, we have to follow its particular logic. The rules of this kind of logic are collected in the metalanguages of each system, and we have to learn them before we can use the system properly and apply it in action. Thus, if I drive along a road, I follow all the twists and turns and obey all the traffic signs I encounter as I drive, because these are part of the rules of road systems. Moreover, if I come to a roundabout, even if there is no sign, I must still give the right of way to those vehicles that are already in the circle. This is, because it is one of the rules of the road system that I was obliged to learn before I began using the roads, with the understanding that whenever I am in the system, I have to follow this rule. Another example of following the internal logic of the system, I am currently using, relates to the grammatical rules of natural languages. When I write in English, I follow its grammatical rules; for example, I always place adjectives before the nouns they modify. If I switch to French, I follow its grammatical rules, placing adjectives before nouns when that is required in French, and placing them after the nouns when that is what French grammar requires. I do this simply because it is a must in the French language system, irrespective

3

Rene Descartes, Discourse on the Method, http://www.literaturepage.com/read/descartes-discourse-onmethod-12.html and http://www.literaturepage.com/read/descartesdiscourse-on-method-13.html; accessed July 2013.

The Logic of Creating and Processing Sign-Systems

193

of any formal logic or logic of matching that I might appear to be applicable to these cases. Logic of application The logic of application relates to how we explain a system and its applications after they were invented and tested in practice. We usually do this in lectures, articles, and the like, when we decide how to explain the system so that it will be clearly understood by our audience. Typically, we choose to implement a different approach for different types of audiences. For example, we would likely choose to introduce a new system to our colleagues in its original form, but when we address laymen, we would choose to use relatively simple signs to convey the essence of the subject without losing the audience. Every genre requires its own form of explanation. Even the most abstract texts can be simplified through the process I call release of excessive abstraction. I wrote about this earlier,4 and will come back to it again later on. Explaining a complex system in a less abstract way requires some pedagogic knowledge and skill; it is not an easy matter. “Logic of application” also refers to the methods used to implement or make use of a sign-system, which may vary from place to place or time to time. Let us take a very patent example. These days, we all buy products in supermarkets, where there are thousands of different goods. We choose our wares and then go to the cashier to pay for them. The cashier collects all the prices automatically from barcodes that are attached to the various commodities. This barcode signsystem is used throughout the world. However, not all the wares in a store are barcoded; there are some local products that arrive at the shop without any packaging or without barcodes on their packaging. In some countries (Israel, for in4

See page 150.

194

Chapter Eleven

stance), the shops prepare special barcode labels for these products. Attaching these labels onto the products costs these shops extra money, because they must pay employees to prepare and attach the required labels. In European countries, the problem of barcode-less products is handled differently. There, the stores print special catalogues for the cashiers to use. The catalogues include pictures of all the barcode-less products, with the barcodes printed beside the pictures so that the cashiers can scan them. This is a less burdensome way of attaching prices, and it reduces the stores’ expenses, although it may also be somewhat less reliable. In these two scenarios, the same barcode sign-system is used, for the same purpose and with the same result, but the logic of its application is different in each locale. These, then, are the four kinds of logic that are applied in every single sign-system in use.

CHAPTER TWELVE ON MERGED SIGNS

In this chapter, I will present a detailed examination of some concrete syntactic rules. The chapter begins with a discussion of the rules for merging signs into more complex entities, which is a process that enables us to replenish the stock of basic signs in the system. This is followed by consideration of the syntactic rules that are used to organize the basic signs of a system into long stretches of sign combinations – syntagmas, sentences, and texts.

Definition of merged signs The main characteristic of mergers is that they are composed either of one basic sign plus diacritics or of several basic signs. In addition, they expand the original stock of basic signs in their systems by partially changing the forms and meanings of their components. This is true, for example, of composite words, chords in musical notation, and mixed colors in painting. Once they have appeared, these compounds are added to the list of basic signs in the system, side-by-side with the basic signs that were used to create them. Let us begin by proposing a formal definition for mergers that are composed of two or more independent signs: Merged signs are signs that are composed either of two or more basic signs that belong to the same system, or of the roots of these basic signs. Note that the end of this definition is very important. The primary components of a compound may either

196

Chapter Twelve

be the complete units of the system (steam + roller = steamroller) or their roots (phil + harmonic = philharmonic). Mergers of this type may also include formants – additional elements that serve to clamp the components together. For example, the compound word “philogenetic” is composed of the root of one basic sign, “phil,” and the basic sign “genetic.” The two parts are held together using the formant “o” (phil + o + genetic). Why do we produce these kinds of mergers? Why do they appear in every sign-system that has developed even a minimal degree of complexity? I have at least two answers to these questions. The main reason for the existence of merged signs is that they make it possible to introduce new signs into the system whose meanings are both intelligible and apparent. Every open-ended system is constantly creating new signs. Consider, for example, a natural language. This kind of system has a tremendous number of words as its basic signs. Nobody knows exactly how many words a given natural language contains, and, in any case, the number is constantly changing. Every minute, as we communicate with one another, new words come up, because people do not hesitate to compose new words for expressing their spontaneous thoughts. Some of the new words become generally accepted and, little-bylittle, even become part of the stock of the words in the language. Thus, in any living language, old words become archaic and gradually disappear, and new words enter the collection. Usually, the newly created words outnumber the obsolete ones, so that the total number of words in any living language constantly increases. How can new words be created? There are two possible ways: either by inventing entirely new designations or by merging two or more existing words. For example, if we want to invent a name for a new kind of ship that is capable of

On Merged Signs

197

breaking ice, we can either choose to use a combination of sounds that is not yet in use as a word in the language, or we can choose to combine two established words, like “ice” and “breaker,” to represent a new compound sign, like “icebreaker.” Using the latter method, we put together not only the words themselves, but, first and foremost, their meanings. The decision to create a new word in this way is always an adventurous one, yet it has its advantages – we need not learn the meaning of the word, because we receive it ready-made from the combination of the linguistic units whose meanings we already knew. There are pros and cons to both ways of creating words, and also limitations to both of them. But, in every living language there are a lot of words that are formed as compounds of existing words, so this must be a very productive and useful method for constructing new words. Natural languages are only one example of sign-systems in which new signs are created by combining existing signs. Every complex sign-system uses this method to form new signs. It is evident, for example, in musical notation, in cartography, in writing, and in phonetic notation. Thus, we can safely assume that it is one of the most universal methods for introducing new signs into existing systems. Nonetheless, as I will explain later on, it is not an easy task to combine signs with preexisting meanings in a way that brings about the required composite effect. Some combinations are very simple and self-evident (like “icebreaker”), while others are very complicated or even quite obscure. In the history of hieroglyphic writing, we come across painstaking attempts to overcome difficulties of this kind in the process of composing increasingly abstract hieroglyphs. For example, Egyptian hieroglyphics had a sign for “house.” It was derived from a picture of a house that was simplified over the course of time into a small rectangle with an aperture. Designing this sign was the simplest task involved in

198

Chapter Twelve

producing a hieroglyph, because the hieroglyph had a very concrete and obvious meaning. When they came to more abstract notions, the Egyptians encountered difficulties. How can you visually express the meaning of “to walk” in an immobile picture? The solution they came up with was to draw two legs in the process of walking. Combining these two signs, they drew the rectangle of the house hieroglyph with two legs under it in order to convey the idea of “leaving the house.” Is the meaning of this compound obvious? Yes and no. Initially, you need clarification in order to grasp its meaning, but after that, it becomes so clear that it seems entirely natural, leaving you with no doubt that it is the only possible meaning. The same can be said of another hieroglyph, in which the idea of a battle was expressed using a picture of two arms – one holding a shield and the second, a sword. At first glance, this sign seems a bit unclear, but after a short explanation, it becomes quite obvious.

Mergers help us work with abstract signs The second and no less important reason for the creation of mergers is that we are unable to work with separate basic signs in very abstract semiotic systems. Imagine algebra without established formulas for implementing its basic signs: what would we do with the Latin letters used in algebraic notations? Consider, also, the task of counting the electric current in a conductor, even if we are completely familiar with such notions as electric field, electric force, density, point charge, and other relevant parameters, and can measure them. Without a formula that connects them together, identifies the appropriate units, and adjusts them as necessary for measuring the relevant values, we can do nothing with them. This problem, in fact, required the prolonged toil of scores of scientists, as well as the genius of Georg Ohm himself, who chose three

On Merged Signs

199

of the relevant types of data and produced a simple and usable formula describing their relationship:

I

V R

This formula is completely clear, both for explaining the relevant concepts and for practical use. The same is true of any formula or linear expression in any technical or mathematical discipline. We cannot freely manipulate the values using only their basic signs, because the signs are too abstract for us to apply. Because of this, scientists have had to find ways to form mergers that are easily decoded and utilized. .

How mergers are created Over time, new objects appear, the properties of existing objects change, and we discover new characteristics of known phenomena. These innovations must be designated in the semiotic systems in which they are relevant. For this purpose, we create new words and other kinds of signs. When we form a new combination of known signs, the combination is recognizable to the users of the system both in form and in meaning. In every system, there are rules for producing such combinations. These rules are included in the metalanguage of the particular system. For example, in Russian grammar, the standard rule for forming compound words is to combine two existing words (or their roots) and insert a syntactic formant – either the letter “o” or the letter “e” – between them to join them together. In Hebrew, the widely accepted rule for producing compound words is called smihut. This rule specifies that a compound word can be created by connecting two known words in such a way that the first one is altered morphologically while the second remains unchanged. The two are connected with a hyphen, though this rule is not always followed in practice.

200

Chapter Twelve

In Chinese, creating mergers is the principal method for producing new words. As B. A. Istrin notes: In ancient Chinese, there were mostly monosyllabic words [naturally, with a lot of different meanings! –A.S.]. In the course of time, these word-units were compacted into more complex, two-syllable and even three- and four-syllable words. Gradually, Chinese hieroglyphs, which initially represented complete words, started to denote morphemes with definite meanings corresponding to their original denotations. The number of such morphemes is much smaller than the number of meanings they represented before. Thus, in the dialect of modern Beijing, there are only about 420 such morphemes that have distinct pronunciations. Taking into account their variations in tone, their range of meanings is not more than one and a half thousand. In modern Chinese, there are very few monosyllabic words. Thus, the overall sum of hieroglyphs in the language is much smaller than the number of words, which reaches many tens of thousands.1

The rules defining the form of a merger are complemented by the inherent rules of logical combinations. Although these rules are not explicitly expressed, people naturally try to juxtapose separate units in such a way that their collective meaning would be immediately clear. They do not always succeed in doing this, at least not at the outset, when a new sign is just being introduced. The first time you encounter a new merger, a number of possible meanings are likely to occur to you. More often than not, you must look up the meaning of a merger in the dictionary when you come across it for the first time. Thus, mergers are not necessarily easier for people to understand the first time they come across them. The main 1

B. A. Istrin,. The Origin and Development of Writing (Moscow, “Science,” 1965). [ɂɫɬɪɢɧ ȼ. Ⱥ. (1965). ȼɨɡɧɢɤɧɨɜɟɧɢɟ ɢ ɪɚɡɜɢɬɢɟ ɩɢɫɶɦɚ. Ɇɨɫɤɜɚ, ɢɡɞ-ɜɨ “ɇɚɭɤɚ”.]

On Merged Signs

201

advantage of using them rather than creating entirely new signs is that it is faster and easier for people to learn and remember them. Still, those who invent merger signs do try to make them as easy to understand at a glance as possible. Different levels of clarity are illustrated by the English words “incomprehensible,” “lackluster,” and “one-step.” Because the two parts of the word “incomprehensible” are familiar, when you come across the word for the first time, you will probably not find it difficult to guess its meaning. “Lackluster” is easily understood in context: “lackluster performance,” “lackluster personality” etc. “One-step,” on the other hand, requires an explanation: although it is the name of a type of ballroom dance, this is not initially obvious. The first time you use it, you would probably want to say “one-step ballroom dance,” to ensure that you are understood. After the term has been explained once, however, it probably would not require any further explanation, because it is fairly easy to understand and remember. (Incidentally, “ballroom” is another example of a merger that is understood immediately, and does not require any additional explanations.) The extent to which a merger requires an accompanying explanation may, in fact, be a measure of its complexity and usability: the more explanation it needs, the less comprehensible it is by itself, and, therefore, the more complex it is.

Constructing a merged sign to replace a wordy explanation Sometimes, when we need to create a new sign, we must go through a lengthy procedure until we isolate a designation with which we are satisfied. At first, we simply explain the object or the occurrence that attracted our attention and try to propose a name for it. Then, we investigate the newly identified phenomenon further. As we learn more about its charac-

202

Chapter Twelve

teristics and peculiarities, we develop a precise name for the object, a name that reflects its essence. For example, we can imagine the naming process for the geometric figure we currently call a “triangle” as follows: When we first identify this type of figure, we notice that it has three corners (angles) and three sides that connect these corners to create a single figure. Because these are the most striking and distinctive features of the figure, we initially call it “a figure with three angles and three sides”. This is a perfectly correct designation, because any figure of this kind invariably possesses these qualities. As we continue our investigation of this figure, we learn more about it. For example, we discover that the sum of the measurements of the three angles in the figure is always 180°. Then, we learn that the figure can have three equal angles, each of which measures 60°. We continue by comparing the qualities of similar triangles. Typically, during the lengthy investigations into a phenomenon such as this, which include exchanges of views among the researchers involved in the project, we shorten the designation of the object to make it easier to pronounce or work with. Thus, we might choose to call our “figure with three angles and three sides” a “triangle”, or perhaps, a “trisider”. In situations like this, the name is usually chosen by the members of the discipline after a short discussion. Once it is chosen, the name is established in the language. In this example, as in many cases, the exact makeup of the merger was influenced by the original, long-winded name that was given to the object. Undoubtedly, the name is somewhat arbitrary, and the figure could have been named differently in the course of the investigation, but once the name is established in the language, it becomes a full part of the system. It becomes a noun and all the rules that are applied to nouns in the language, such as rules related to gender, number, or case, are applied to it. In addition, from this point on, it is included

On Merged Signs

203

in all serious dictionaries of the language to which it was added. From a semiotic perspective, this means that the collection of basic signs in the language receives another member. For our discussion, this is very important, because we distinguish between this type of compound, which is incorporated into the collection of basic signs in this way, and the type described in the next section, in which the compound sign is part of a higher level of signs than its parts.

Building a higher level of signs above an existing level Another process for creating new merger signs consists of putting together signs that already exist in the system, just as in the cases described above, but the aim is different: the aim is to produce a sign of a higher syntactic level than its components. This process is the inverse of what I described in the previous section, and it can take place in a number of stages. It is used, for example, in chemistry, when the symbols of elements are united to create names for molecules, when molecules are put together to construct substances, and when substances are grouped together to form reactions. Similarly, in painting, separate strokes of color blend to produce parts of a body, bodies comprise these parts and are themselves put together as components of pictures. In all these examples, basic signs are included in ever more complex syntactic units. These units may be unique, like a text composed of words, a picture composed of various subjects, or a three-dimensional work of art like a sculpture or a carving. These are all examples of finite units produced by means of a sign-system. There are also indefinite units, like, for example, words that are united in syntagmas (several words in succession), which in turn are incorporated into sen-

204

Chapter Twelve

tences, which are themselves included in paragraphs, and so forth: words ĺ syntagmas ĺ sentences ĺ paragraphs or other parts of text This last type of compound may sometimes evolve into a stable unit in the system, albeit a unit of a more composite character than the basic signs from which it is made. In this sort of compound, the basic signs of a system are used to construct larger units. Over time, these units become established in the system and are ultimately incorporated into it as new composite signs. Then they become real mergers. Thus, in languages, a sequence of words that is often repeated (a normal combination of basic signs) can evolve, like this: sequence of words ĺ stable phrase ĺ figurative expression ĺ idiom Each of these points is a stage in the evolution from chance word combination to idiom – that is, to an unbreakable combination of words, some of which do not retain their original meanings. During this process, the previous meanings of the units are consolidated into a distinct entity with its own weight and meaning. The intermediate stages are consecutive points representing the gradual, constant evolution of the original meanings of the words into the elements comprising the combination. The following word combinations illustrate the different stages in the evolution of word combinations: 1. Peace-for-territories negotiations 2. Keep the log rolling 3. You roll my log and I’ll roll yours 4. Lock, stock, and barrel

On Merged Signs

205

The first phrase is a normal combination of words that is currently used very often, because of the endless process of negotiations going on in Israel. Let us hope that the process itself will come to an end sometime. When it does, this expression will disappear from common usage. The second phrase is clear in its intention, though it may be used figuratively from time to time. The third phrase is definitely and completely figurative in meaning, in spite of the fact that its source is clearly comprehensible. The final phrase – lock, stock and barrel – belongs to the realm of idioms. We use it to mean “completely”, “absolutely”; most people who use it never think of the rifle that gave birth to the saying. Some idioms go even further in acquiring a new meaning as a whole, because their parts completely lose their connections to their original meanings. This, then, is how we create a new linguistic unit that is stable in form. It is important to note that a unit of this type belongs to a different category of linguistic signs from that of the words it contains. Idioms are treated differently from words and have their own characteristics. They are collected in special dictionaries of phrases and are analyzed differently. It is interesting that there is a difficulty in composing this type of dictionary, in that lexicographers have a hard time deciding in what order to present the idioms. Clearly, they must be in alphabetical order, but the choice of which word in the idiom to use for this purpose remains problematic. For example, if we include the idiom “bird of peace” in a dictionary, should we list it under “bird”, under “peace”, or perhaps under both? This difficulty is actually an outgrowth of the fact that the whole unit has a different meaning from each of its parts. The same is true not only of linguistic signs, but of compounds in all sign-systems. In chemistry, compounds of elements are used to construct designations of molecules. These compounds become signs in their own right, with their own

206

Chapter Twelve

laws defining how they can be used and how they can be put together to construct other composites. In mathematics, the elementary signs are treated quite differently from their compounds. Tens, hundreds, and thousands, though composed of the same digits that appear autonomously, are conspicuously different in their behavior and results. Each of them comprises basic signs of a specific sub-system, obeys different laws of transformation, and has a distinct meaning.

Adding supplementary features to an existing sign The simplest way to build mergers is by adding newlydiscovered information to an existing sign. In this case, the sign does not change, but the knowledge we have about the thing it represents broadens. The additional information is added into the original sign in some way. One example of this is Mendeleev’s periodic table. This is the version of the periodic table that was introduced at its inception in 1869:

Figure 12-1

On Merged Signs

207

Mendeleev’s table was nine tenths of the way there, but needed one important modification before it became the modern periodic table – the use of atomic number as the organizing principle for the periods. Mendeleev placed his elements in order of their relative atomic mass, and this gave him some problems. For example, iodine has a lower relative atomic mass than tellurium, so it should come before tellurium in Mendeleev’s table – but in order to get iodine in the same group as other elements with similar properties such as fluorine, chlorine and bromine, he had to put it after tellurium, breaking his own rules. Using atomic number instead of atomic mass as the organizing principle was first proposed by the British chemist Henry Moseley in 1913, and it solved anomalies like this one. Iodine has a higher atomic number than tellurium – so, even though he didn’t know why, Mendeleev was right to place it 2 after tellurium after all.

The use of atomic number instead of atomic mass was not the only change made over time in the way elements were presented in the table. There were many other characteristics of the elements that were discovered after Mendeleev and were then incorporated into the full representation of each known element. Thus, we now include about 120 elements in the table, each of which appears with many of its properties (atomic mass and atomic number; number of protons, neutrons, and electrons in the atom; isotopes; etc.), many of which were not included in the original version of the table.

2

“Moseley’s Periodic Table,” http://www.corrosion-doctors.org/ Periodic/Periodic-Moseley.htm; accessed March 2015.

208

Chapter Twelve

The main features of mergers Mergers can have many traits and characteristics. I have selected three of them that, to my mind, are the most relevant for our discussion here: that mergers are more than the sums of their parts; that every merger has a central element; and that, in many cases, the subordinate parts of a merger can be manipulated without changing the nature of the merger. Compounds are much more than the sums of their parts When we construct a merger, we do not only unite different elements within it, we also try to achieve something special that cannot be accomplished in any other way. Admittedly, this special thing is arrived at by putting components together, but it is not simply the sum of those parts. Rather, the result is something qualitatively new, a unified product that has its own gestalt. For example, when we build a house, we do not end up with a simple sum of the compartments that are located under the same roof, but with a whole entity that we call a house. Had we built a single room, we would have built it differently. We would not have made any connections between compartments, or built staircases and the like. In essence, the fact that the compartments were placed together forced us to create a special aggregate with its own particular features. The same is true of every compound sign. The simplest example is a composite of numbers. “5” is a digit, and it has some distinct characteristics. For instance, it is more than 4 and less than 6; adding it to 2 returns 7; and its value is equivalent to five ones. If we construct the compound sign “55,” we designate a number with two 5s, but this number is not a simple sum of these two parts. It has additional qualities, like the fact that it is part of the sixth ten, and that it is not only divisible by 5, but also by 11, which is not true of separate fives.

On Merged Signs

209

This is not at all the same as the sum of two fives, 5 + 5 = 10. Other examples are composite words and phrases, including idioms. In each of these, we gain something special when we create the composite, something that surpasses the simple sum of its elements. When it comes to creating merged signs, we rarely get a result that was unambiguously planned beforehand. In addition, we seldom attain what we want the first time we try. Instead, if we succeed at all, it is generally only well into the process, when we are nearer to our goal, and, even then, we usually only succeed partially. To hit the bull’s eye, you have to be a master. The famous Russian writer, Fyodor Dostoevsky, liked to create compound words out of existing ones. Only one word that he created in this way actually became part of the Russian language: ɫɬɭɲɟɜɚɬɶɫɹ (to efface oneself, wear away). All the rest played well in his works, but were not picked up for posterity. The same is true of all merged signs: they are usually well suited to a particular place and purpose, but only rarely do they move from their initial environment to be used more generally. Even when they do, it is likely to be a slow process. It takes time to introduce a new merger into common usage, and additional time is required for the compound to coalesce into something inseparable and easily understood as a single unit. Identifying the leading element in a merger In every merger, one element is central, and all the other parts of the compound are organized around this leading element. When a compound is first created, it is usually easy to identify which component is its leading element. Consider, for example, the signs used in cartography to identify settlements. In maps, a dot is usually used to mark the locations of populated areas. The dots are sometimes colored, and may vary in size in accordance with the number of inhabitants living in

210

Chapter Twelve

each of the settlements they represent. Each dot is accompanied by the name of the settlement. This composition reflects the structure of this compound sign. In it, we easily discern its central and leading part: a dot representing the denoted settlement. The center of the dot shows us the exact place where this settlement is situated in the real world as it is reflected in the map. All the other components are additions that characterize the central element. Thus, the name may be put in various locations relative to the dot – wherever the mapmaker finds room for it. Where he puts the name is not very important; the main thing is not to break its connection to the dot in such a way that their relationship is not clear. As long as this is done, all of the components of the compound, and the links between them, remain intact and preserved. Identifying the leading component and its subordinates in a compound is very important, because the compound sign remains intact as long as its leading component remains unchanged. By contrast, the subordinate components can be manipulated without effectively changing the compound sign into something else. One reason for this is that the leading and the subordinate parts of a compound initially have different degrees of abstraction. In fact, it is because of this that they can be separated. The more a compound is used, the more its parts become “glued” together and lose their initial characteristics. When the components of a compound sign can no longer be separated, I call the sign a merger. Compound signs and mergers are related, but they are nonetheless two distinct kinds of signs. Compounds are mergers in their initial stages, when we can still easily discern the meaning of each part in the combination. Thus, the more established and stable a compound becomes, the less we can handle its components separately. They lose their autonomy because of the unifying, centripetal force that joins them together. In some com-

On Merged Signs

211

pounds, especially in very closely integrated mergers, separating the elements becomes entirely impossible – as I tried to show above when I discussed linguistic idioms – but in the earlier stages of a compound’s existence, it is feasible.

Manipulating compounds As I explained above, before a merger becomes completely unified, we can manipulate its subordinate signs. In fact, manipulation is often the main way we use compound signs. Consider the algebraic sign-system. Its nomenclature signs are the letters a, b, c, etc. What would you do with these letters if they were autonomous and separate? There is not much you could do. Only when they are inserted into expressions, and handled according to predefined rules, can you make practical use of them. Then, and only then, will you know how to make use of the tools available in the algebraic branch of mathematics. Using these expressions, and their accompanying rules of manipulation, are the only possible means for applying this system. It follows that the basic algebraic signs are not separate letters, but the expressions that are based on them. And these expressions are typical compounds, because their elements can still be isolated and worked with separately. The same is also true of chemistry. What would we do, for example, with the sign for the benzoic molecule? The primary way chemists use a sign like this is by manipulating its components – by substituting different elements for some of the existing ones, whenever it is feasible to do so. The utility of manipulating the elements of a merger is clear when we are talking about algebra, chemistry, and many other technical disciplines. In many other semiotic applications, the possibility of manipulating compounds is not so obvious, and many specialists employ compounds primarily as they are presented in the theory, in their initial forms. They

212

Chapter Twelve

only dare to touch compounds slightly, because they are afraid of breaking their unstable inner balance.

Manipulating different parts of compounds From what I said above, the necessity of manipulating compounds is quite obvious. Now we will look at how this manipulation can be done. We will begin with a simple case, that of underscoring a part of a compound. Then, we will discuss manipulation that turns the manipulated part into a kind of morpheme in the system. Finally, we will look at using this method to formulate a new sign-system. Underscoring a part of a compound Underscoring can be done to any part of a compound. Let us take an example from topographic signs. Topography, in contrast to cartography, uses plans rather than maps. In topographic plans, most signs resemble the objects they designate – typically, they are images that look like prototypes of the objects. By contrast, in maps we primarily use conventional signs. Consequently, in topography the signs are divided into two large groups: “scaled signs” (geographical and conventional) and “unscaled signs” (topographical and isomorphic). The latter group includes, for example, signs that depict the figure of a tree, which are used to represent single trees that are visible in the area included in the plan, and squares that are used to depict buildings. These signs do not necessarily match the scale of the plan, and are simply inserted into the picture as it is. Nonetheless, these signs must be placed in the plan in their correct locations. In order to do this accurately, we mark a central point in the sign’s base. This point is used to show the exact place where the object is situated among all of the objects shown in the plan. Thus, we add a sort of leg to the figure of the tree, with a shape like a small dash at its bot-

On Merged Signs

213

tom. (The leg shape reminds me of an Egyptian hieroglyph that means “to exit the house.”) The exact middle of the dash is used to show the place where the tree stands relative to the other objects in the plan. Similar legs are also added to the signs representing sculptures, monuments, bus stops, and the like. Not only images can be treated in this way. We often do the same thing with compound words and other linguistic units. In a whole text, we can single out complete words, and in words, we can underscore the blocks from which the words are constructed. We do this in many different ways. In the current text, I use italics to underscore words; the meaning of the underscored words remains as it is, but the italics indicate that these words are central to the idea I am discussing. For people who are studying a language, we sometimes highlight new words and expressions with a bright color or even insert copies of them into the margins. The most popular method used for drawing attention to difficult points in a text is by inserting references. We can use references to define rare words and explain their relevance to the subject under discussion. References can be inserted in a number of ways. They can be placed immediately after the reference sign, at the bottom of the page, at the end of the chapter, at the end of the entire text, or even in some external location. Today, computers give us additional options: with the help of hyperlinks (which themselves are mergers) we can immediately call up the required explanations from some distant location in the electronic depositories. I remember how, in my school years, I received my written compositions back after my teacher had corrected them. There were marks on the words that I had written incorrectly. Sometimes, the marks showed what the correct spelling or usage was; at other times, the incorrect words were simply underlined. These corrections were always marked by checkmarks

214

Chapter Twelve

in the margins and written in red ink. All of these markings were compound signs that were used to show me the correct spelling or usage of the words. That is, the words themselves remained, but they were transformed into a new format in order to draw attention to them. Using the subordinate parts of compounds as accepted morphemes When people see that a particular method for creating a compound is welcomed by the public, they often begin to apply that method to other signs. In this way, the original compound can become a model for creating a whole class of related signs. Eventually, a rule based on the model is defined and becomes accepted. Typically, rules of this type are distilled from the most successful models of compound construction. For example, during the Enlightenment, many people undertook the study of the science and art of the ancient Greeks and Romans, and also began intensive studies of the ancient Greek and Latin languages. As a result, they borrowed a lot of words from these languages and used them to designate new notions. They did this by using Greek and Latin words as flexions for new formations. Thus, prefixes like inter-, a-, and sub- became part of many modern languages. These were ready-made blocks that had fixed and clear meanings and could be used to build compounds in any living tongue. It is not only ancient languages that can serve as sources for this type of borrowing. Modern languages also readily provide us with such material. Thus, after the invention of computers, the English word “ware” became a fountainhead for a lot of computer-related terms, like “software,” “firmware,” and “spyware.” Some of these terms were absorbed very quickly into other languages when computers arrived at the places in which these languages were spoken.

On Merged Signs

215

It is very important to understand that this process is finalized with the formulation of formal rules that transform the patterns used in successful models into obligatory forms. Thus, in Russian we have the following rule for the formation of compound words: two (or more) word-roots are connected together by the formative letters “o” or “e.” In Hebrew, as I wrote above, we also have rules for building word blends. These rules require us to change the first element of the combination in particular ways in order to create a compound. English seems to have relatively unrestricted methods for constructing such combinations. In this regard, English appears to be the least morphologically limited language, and this is its greatest advantage. Thus far, I have focused on linguistic examples, but this process of developing and standardizing rules for creating compounds is also evident in all other classes of signs. Let us take a quick look at the signs denoting measuring units. In this very practical sphere of life, we use both independent and compound signs. We use simple signs like km. (kilometer), h. (hour), sec. (second), but we also use mergers like km/h and per hour. Designations of the type km/h are very widely used in everyday life. They have also given rise to many other compounds of this kind. Why? Because this type of compound uses clear-cut and comprehensible units, and also shows how to use them in calculations. What is the slash in this compound, if not a division sign? It indicates that, for measuring speed, we have to divide the distance we go by the time we spend traversing it. In physics, we use a formula to express the same thing: s = d/t (speed = distance divided by time). The term “per” serves the same purpose in phrases. The Latin word “per” means “for each”. “Per capita” means “for each person,” “per week” means “for each week,” etc. If we want to know what the average density of China’s population

216

Chapter Twelve

is, we have to divide the whole of the Chinese population by its territory (in square kilometers). This gives us the average number of people living in each square kilometer of the Chinese state (number of people per sq. km.). On the other hand, in formulas like the one that is used to calculate the amount of work done, we must multiply: W = Fd (where W is the work performed, F is the force applied, in joules, and d is the distance that was traversed). Sometimes we present the result in kgm – kilograms moved over a distance that is defined in meters (pronounced kilogram-meters). The very form of the sign for this unit shows that we calculate it by multiplication. Using parts of existing mergers to construct additional sign-systems Sometimes, a sign-system is built by modifying another system whose signs are very abstract and complex. This is not a rare occurrence in human history, but nobody has given it proper attention yet, as far as I know. A striking example of this sort of construction can be found in various systems of writing. Let us look at the alphabetic systems of writing, because this process is relatively easy to demonstrate and understand with regard to them. The first alphabet was invented in the Near East. Some say that it was invented by Phoenicians, others claim that it was created by ancient Jews; this is not very important in the current discussion. The fact is that the principle of an alphabet was much easier to implement than the previous systems of writing. This was so obvious that alphabets were borrowed by all peoples who created their systems of writing after the first alphabet was invented. The Semitic alphabet was used in ancient Greece, from there it went to Rome, and from there it traveled elsewhere. The first borrowings only made use of the original alphabet, each time ad-

On Merged Signs

217

justing it to the needs of various ethnoses. Later, there were variations in the very process of copying alphabetic systems. When the Cyrillic script was invented by the two brothers, Cyril and Methodius, it was based on the Greek alphabet that already existed, and most of the characters were taken from the Greek alphabet. It was initially introduced into the region that is currently Bulgaria; soon afterwards, it penetrated into other Slavic countries. Each country implemented it in accordance with its own needs. Sometimes, new letters were inserted that corresponded with the specific sounds of a particular tongue; sometimes additional strokes were added to the Greek letters in order to represent similar sounds. More often than not, the forms of the letters changed. In short, every Slavic language developed its own alphabet; each alphabet resembled the original Greek one, but also had many new features. These differences were not very hard to introduce, since each alphabet comprised only a score or so of characters. The important point is that they borrowed an easy writing system, and this very quickly advanced the civilizations in the countries that adopted it. Religious prose and liturgy were produced almost immediately, and that changed the cultural climate in the entire region. Hieroglyphic writing systems went through a similar borrowing process, but the process was more complex, because these systems included thousands of signs (hieroglyphs). Nevertheless, the borrowing process did occur in what is generally called the eastern part of the world. The first hieroglyphic script in the Far East was introduced in China. It took a lot of time for this script to become established, since there were thousands of hieroglyphs, and it was not easy to cope with them. I will not discuss the history of the Chinese writing system itself now; let us skip ahead to the story of how it was copied by the people who lived near ancient China and had close ties with it. It is worthwhile to note that, over time, all

218

Chapter Twelve

the peoples of that part of the world borrowed the script from the Chinese. Among them were the Japanese, the Koreans, and the people of Tibet, Mongolia, and many other regions. For the purposes of our discussion, the most interesting example of the adoption of the Chinese writing system may be the Tangut hieroglyphic script. The Tangut empire obtained its independence from the Chinese Song dynasty at the beginning of the 11th century, and was destroyed by Gengis Khan in 1227. In 1038, the Tangut emperor, Li Yuanhao, appointed Yieli Renrong, a scholar who was close to the imperial family, to create an official script for the Tangut language. “After the destruction of the empire, the script did not completely disappear, and it was used at least until the end of the 15th century. It consisted of approximately 6,600 logographic characters built from radicals, in much the same way as they were in the Chinese.”3 For us, it is of particular interest to see how that script was produced from the existing Chinese hieroglyphics. Yieli Renrong took Chinese hieroglyphs that were well-known in his time, and he used them to produce the signs for his own language. He did not, however, borrow them intact. In fact, in many cases, he only combined parts of the hieroglyphs, which resembled their wholes in an unambiguous manner, so that their meanings would be understood. Thus, he utilized many Chinese script signs that already existed and created new signs from their parts. For this purpose, he divided the space occupied by one hieroglyph into clearly defined fragments, separating the existing parts into two, three, or four geometrical areas, and even giving each area a name. Thus, the upper part of the hieroglyphic space was called head, the lower part was called bottom, the extreme left was called side, the extreme right was called help and the central part (if it was 3

David Boxenhorn, “Understanding Tangut,” http://www.rishonrishon.com/archives/195780.php (2006); accessed February 2011.

On Merged Signs

219

used), was called middle. Accordingly, he not only isolated various areas of the borrowed signs, but also defined in advance the role each part would play in each new hieroglyph he designed. When he created a sign, he simply said: “For this new sign, we shall take the head from this hieroglyph and the bottom from that one. By adding their complementary meanings, we will get the sign we need for this specific notion.” In this manner, he could very quickly produce the new script that the emperor ordered from him. Let us illustrate this point with some examples from the Tangut script he designed: Example 1: The new hieroglyph (pronounced ), which meant “rule”, was constructed from the middle of the Chinese sign (pronounced ), which represented negation, “not”, and the help part of the Chinese sign (pronounced ), which meant “to pass, to cross”. The whole compound meant “not to pass”, which was understood to mean a “rule that was promulgated”. Example 2: The new hieroglyph

(pronounced

), which meant “to untie”, was constructed from the head of the Chinese sign

(pronounced

meant “rope”, and the whole of the Chinese sign

), which (pro-

), which meant “to get free.”4 nounced In these examples, we see what may be called the second level of sign production. Its denotation is not based on the natural phenomena it represents, but on signs that were previously introduced and well-known. Yieli Renrong did not produce signs by simply taking the old ones and altering them in minor details, as was done in Slavic variants of the Cyrillic 4

Istrin (see note, page 202)

Chapter Twelve

220

alphabet. He also surpassed the Egyptians, who produced new signs by connecting two easily understood pictures to create a new sign, as in the drawing of two hands – one holding a shield and the other holding a sword – that they created to denote the notion of a battle.5 That was ingenious, but it was also a rather obvious design. By contrast, Yieli Renrong took signs which did not resemble their referents at all and made them the source for his innovations. This is what I call the second level of sign production: the transformation of signs according to a preconceived method that was cleverly thought out in advance.

5

See page 200.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN LEVELS OF SYNTACTIC RULES

In chapter 7, I introduced the four levels of syntax, but I only delved partially into that topic. In the current chapter, I will look at some syntactic devices that help us build the different syntactic levels of a semiotic text. Naturally, we will begin with the morphological level.

The morphological level: the choice of basic signs When you begin to study or work with a sign-system, the first thing you do is single out its basic signs. If you are dealing with a small sign-system, like the traffic semaphore system, it is not difficult to identify the leading signs. You can even teach small children to do so, and you can begin at any point in the system. With small sign-systems, the whole system can be mastered through a few instructions. On the other hand, when you approach any system that is at least somewhat complicated, you will find different groups of signs – signs with various purposes, uses, and degrees of abstraction. With such sign-systems, you must attempt to identify the leading signs for your purpose, those signs that organize all the other types of signs into a particular arrangement so that they work harmoniously together. Identifying these signs is not an easy task; your chances of success depend mostly on the size of the system and on your qualifications for the job. Consider a system that is only slightly more complicated than the traffic-semaphore system, like a draughts game. To

222

Chapter Thirteen

teach this system, you would have to dedicate more time, and you would have to introduce some of its elements in a particular order, because their functionality is built on that of other elements. You would clarify how many pieces are used in the game, how they are positioned on the board, how they move, how they capture the opponent’s pieces, etc. Still, even in this case, the choice of basic signs is not challenging, because there are not really any choices to make, at least not at the outset of the game; the basic signs are the pieces, and their initial syntax is the way they are laid out on the board at the beginning of the game. In chess, the situation is much more complicated, but it is still not very difficult to explain, since there are still no choices to be made before play begins. (As play progresses, different options for the continuations of draughts and chess games abound, of course.) Real choices begin with language systems, continue with notations, and are greatly enhanced in formalized systems.1 In languages, choices are a must, because these systems are vast and include many groups of signs with multiple qualities. In systems with higher degrees of abstraction than languages, the options actually decrease in number: because these systems do not support external input that can help their users navigate within them, the number of ways their signs can be used must be reduced, and the conditions for using them must be more rigid. With highly abstract systems, choosing the right basic signs becomes a condition sine qua non. Doing so guarantees that you will be able to build the correct hierarchy of all the other kinds of signs in the system, which, in turn, ensures that you will be able to navigate correctly within the system. To clarify what I mean, I will present a few illustrations of these ideas. Let us begin with language systems. If you select words as your leading signs, all smaller signs, as well as signs 1

These are the higher levels of my taxonomy of sign-systems. See “Semiotic taxonomy and classifications,” page 31.

Levels of Syntactic Rules

223

that belong to different systems, become subordinate to words and, as a result, retreat into the background. Thus, signs that are secondary to words (morphemes, letters, phonetic marks, etc.) recede from your awareness, and you concentrate your efforts on studying words, remembering their meanings, and internalizing rules for assembling them into larger units. These larger units would themselves be the center of your interest if you switched to other syntactic levels of language systems. But, in that case, you would actually be working with other language systems, in which the leading signs were, for example, sentences, or paragraphs. This issue is not only of theoretical concern; it has tremendous practical implications. Let me give you an example from my personal professional experience. By profession, I am a teacher of languages. In Russia, I taught English to children, and in Israel, I taught Hebrew to adults. Soon after I began teaching adults, I noticed a difference between teaching adults and teaching children. Unlike the classes of children, the adult classes could be divided into two groups, based on their educational backgrounds: simple people of little education, and professionals of high and advanced intellectual interests. Each group of adults approached the study of a new language differently. The less educated people digested the words of the new language just like children do; they just grasped the bond between a word and its meaning and remembered it. But the more educated people demanded explanations of relevant grammatical categories, their places in sentences, and alternative definitions of words. This latter type of student had simply learned this kind of thinking from previous experience, and could no longer think in a more primitive way. This is why, in the early stages of training in a new language, illiterate people tend to advance much more quickly than literate people do – much to the chagrin of the latter

224

Chapter Thirteen

group, who find the situation rather strange and frustrating. Later on, however, when the class begins to deal with the syntactic bonds and rules of the language, members of the first group tend to get stuck and do not understand the linguistic implications of the subject matter, while the more literate students are compensated for their earlier difficulties, because they can handle these levels. Being aware of this difference in learning styles and abilities clearly has practical implications. Choosing the correct basic signs for the students in a language class has a decisive impact on the likelihood that those students will make good progress: for children and relatively uneducated adults, you have to use words as the basic units throughout the entire course, but for the more educated adults, you should quickly switch to focusing on the syntactic units as the basic units of the language. Not only is the structure of the system presented differently to each group, the way you approach its processing rules is also different. Let us turn to some other kinds of sign-systems, from other levels of abstraction. We can begin with cartography. Cartography is geographic notation, and, as such, it belongs to a higher level of abstraction than languages. Even so, its signs have tremendous variation in their degrees of abstraction, and this fact makes it very instructive to analyze cartographic systems in detail. Before we begin, though, I want to remind you that as a sign-system moves up in its level of abstraction, changes are introduced in its signs as well, so that the signs also gradually become more abstract. We shall observe these changes step-by-step as we look at cartography, because it includes various methods of reproducing space relations by means of different sign-systems that were developed and honed in the course of human civilization. Our aim will be to analyze the introduction of new basic signs and their syntactic bonds as cartographic systems progressed over the ages.

Levels of Syntactic Rules

225

At first, people simply drew their surroundings as they saw them. In this regard, there is a very interesting story included in the report on the voyages of the American Naval Captain Charles Wilkes during the 1840s. When Wilkes arrived at an unknown archipelago (today these islands are called the Tuamotu Archipelago), he was not sure which route would be the best to take to pass through the islands. He asked a friendly native for information about the best passage, and the man drew a sketch of the route right onto the bridge of the ship. He also accompanied the ship through the passage, and his drawing was shown to match the actual route of the vessel very accurately. The native’s drawing is an example of cartography in its most “natural” mode. As cartography developed further, the images people used gradually changed from being very realistic to being more and more stylized and conventional. In this way, earth cartography as we know it and as it is in use to this day, came into existence. At that stage of its development, all the basic signs of earth cartography were images. Over time, these basic signs continued to mature and become more abstract, as mathematical models were used to guide the way they would be combined in maps and other cartographic models. In this way, cartographic signs came to be members of the notational class. Nowadays, a new form of cartography has come into existence: interstellar cartography. This branch of cartography is now passing through stages of development that are very similar to those that were previously undergone by earth cartography. Interstellar cartography began with navigational pictures that were sent from satellites. These pictures are comparable to the realistic drawings of early earth cartography, in what I called its “natural mode.” Because they are taken from a distance, they allow us to see our planet as it appears from afar, rather than from an earthbound perspective.

226

Chapter Thirteen

In addition, we have found ways to use them to help us navigate between two points on the surface of the planet. We are now beginning to expand interstellar cartography to include the cartographies of other cosmic objects beside the Earth. These future cartographies will have signs that are embodied in special images that are different from those of earth cartography. They will also employ special mathematical models for organizing those signs within their semiotic fields. Each of these cosmic cartographies will have different basic signs from one another and from earth cartography. I could present a number of other examples, but I think the ones I have given are sufficient to clarify the role of basic signs in the workings of sign-systems. Let me just repeat once more – because it is very important point – that when the basic signs of a system are chosen, they organize all the other signs around them into hierarchies. Furthermore, the systems themselves evolve largely around the rules related to the dynamics of those basic signs. And, this brings us to the next question: what are these rules? This is what we will focus on in the next section.

Morphological paradigms During the morphological stage, each basic sign is given the features it will need in order to function effectively in the syntactic level that will be built upon it. Basic signs with a single referent acquire these things individually, while basic signs that belong to groups get them as members of their groups. Every proper name is given a description, and specifications for each member of each group are prepared. In some cases, these specifications do not completely suit some members of the group, and the peculiarities of these members are included in special commentaries that are attached to their descriptions. I call the complete morphological armory of a sign its morphological paradigm. (I coined this term based on the

Levels of Syntactic Rules

227

name used for this phenomenon in its grammatical incarnation in linguistics – noun paradigms, verbal paradigms, etc.) Note that the meaning of paradigm here is different from that of the term in branches of sciences; these two meanings should not be confused. As usual, we will look at some examples from linguistics first and then round out our understanding by considering some examples from other sign-systems.2 In German, Russian, and Latin, noun paradigms are very extensive. In Russian, for example, there are six cases for each noun in the singular and six cases for the plural. There are multiple declensions for nouns in masculine, feminine, and neuter genders, as well as a massive number of exceptions. By contrast, there are relatively few English noun paradigms, but they do exist. In English, there are far more verb paradigms than noun paradigms (because of the many tenses), but they are still relatively limited in number in comparison with Korean. But the quantity of distinct paradigms is not what really matters. The important point is that every single word in every language is equipped with its own paradigm; otherwise, we could not use them in different syntactic contexts. If we did not prepare a paradigm for a word, we would not be able to insert it into even the simplest syntagmas. Preparations of this sort are performed on the morphological level, and are studied in the part of grammar that is properly called morphology. The rules of morphological paradigms include not only the acceptable forms of each word, but also explanations about when and how these forms should be employed. In systems that are less abstract than languages, the morphological paradigms are much simpler. In painting, for example, the artist may study the rules for combining different 2

Let me briefly explain why I refer to linguistics so often. It is because language systems are used to explain all other sign-systems (I will elaborate on this later), so it is best to begin with them.

228

Chapter Thirteen

colors and for joining details into compounds and compositions, but he acquires most of his skills from practice. This is also clear from the way people paint: they put a few dabs of paint on the canvas, and then stop to look at the object they are depicting. While they surely also use theoretical knowledge, they rely more on their artistic intuition and on looking at things in nature. The same is true in every practical occupation; consider, for example, the systems used for orienting oneself within the forest or on the open sea without employing any special instruments. In systems that are more abstract than languages, morphological paradigms are supported by mergers (which I wrote about in the previous chapter). On our own, we would not be able to work with very abstract isolated signs, so they are given to us as mergers – as ready-made formulas or easily solved chemical reactions. This also means that, in such systems, the basic signs are not nomenclature designations; they are merged into something more complicated, on a higher syntactic level. We will discuss this in the next section.

Syntactic levels above morphological paradigms After lengthy reflection, I have decided to present all the syntactic levels above the morphological level together. I reached this conclusion in light of three considerations. First, these syntactic levels are too interwoven and interdependent to be dealt with separately. Second, introducing them together gives me the opportunity to present them in order from the lowest to the highest and also in the opposite direction – from texts down to syntagmas. And third, this method gives me the best opportunities to explain more of the terminology I have been using. I think it is high time I explained some of the terms I have already employed, and illustrated them with examples.

Levels of Syntactic Rules

229

The real dynamic of syntactic ties within any text consists of the gradual building from smaller to larger syntactic blocks, and from simpler to more complicated ones. This can be compared to the building of a house: first we put together the smallest building blocks – say, the bricks – and form a part of a wall. This part may be of one kind or another; it may be built to contain a door or a window, or it may be constructed without any room for an aperture. Next, all the parts of the wall are collected into a complete wall. Later, when all the walls and other components of the building are ready, we combine them into the structure of the complete house. The same thing happens with syntactic levels. Morphological rules allow us to construct syntagmas, the syntagmas are merged into sentences, and the assembled sentences are collected into a text or its excerpts. (In language systems, these excerpts are paragraphs, chapters, etc.) The syntagmatic level groups separate signs into the smallest units of understandable meaning. In languages, these are syntagmas. For example, “a wonderful landscape” is a linguistic syntagma that comprises three words. (Words are the basic signs of all natural languages.) This syntagma has a central unit (“landscape”), which organizes two other auxiliary signs. Together, these three words define the essence of the syntagma: “wonderful” defines it qualitatively, and an article indicates that the object is as yet unknown, and is one of many items that fit the definition. The syntagmatic level presents words not as a string of isolated accretions, in which one word is simply placed after another, but as a group of words that are adapted in accordance with the morphological rules that were applied to them at the previous level, and are placed and linked together in accordance with the syntactic rules of the syntagmatic level. In English, a syntagmatic rule states that adjectives must stand before the nouns they modify, and another rule states that an in-

230

Chapter Thirteen

definite article is only used with singular nouns. Yet another syntagmatic rule states that an indefinite article in a syntagma takes its usual form, “a,” when it precedes a consonant, but before vowels it obtains a different articulation, “an.” The same syntagma in Russian will have a different form, “ɡɚɦɟɱɚɬɟɥɶɧɵɣ ɩɟɣɡɚɠ”; it will contain only two units (there are no articles in Russian), and the connection between the noun and the adjective modifying it will be expressed differently. In Hebrew, the adjective will be placed after the noun. All of the rules mentioned above must be learned before the separate words can be arranged in syntagmatic blocks. We could not pronounce or write these syntagmas without knowing these rules. Yet, at this level we also implement some rules that pave the way for us to connect various syntagmas into more complicated units later on, at the sentence level. For our example, we must obtain information about whether the syntagma will serve as a subject group in the finalized English sentence in which it will be included. If it will, we will be able to build the sentence without making any additional changes to the syntagma, as in the sentence, “A wonderful landscape opened before our eyes,” because the syntagma already followed the rules of word order in English sentences. There is nothing novel in what I have said thus far about syntactic rules. Any linguistic analysis of the building of simple and more complex sentences comprises the same information. Nonetheless, although there is nothing new in my assertions from the standpoint of linguistic analysis, I needed to present them before I could introduce the semiotic angle to the discussion. Let us now look at this topic from a semiotic point of view, and, more specifically, from the point of view of general semiotics, which is intended to be applicable to all kinds of texts, and not only to linguistic texts. When we deal with the

Levels of Syntactic Rules

231

general semiotic angle, we use the term sign instead of word. The central sign of the syntagma “a wonderful landscape” appears as a merger (“land” + “scape”), and is used as a basic sign in English. The combination of the two words, “wonderful” and “landscape,” is treated as a compound, but not as a merger (and there are numerous similar compounds: dull landscape, peaceful landscape, etc.). Why do I need to look at the semiotic aspect of these things that are already well-known in linguistics? Because they help me to build a bridge between general semiotics and all its applications in various systems. Let us consider a few examples. For variety’s sake, let us look at a system of poetic meters. (Note, however, that such a system will be different in every language.) In all poetic meters, the basic sign is a combination of stressed and unstressed syllables. (This is a very different basic sign from the words that are the basic signs of prose text.) Syllables (individual sounds in oral speech) may comprise two, three, or even more letters. They have a morphological level, in which the rules for incorporating them into more advanced syntactic levels are defined. As with linguistic systems, these levels are the syntagmatic level (In the argot of this sign system, a syntagma is called a foot.), the sentence level (called a line), and the text level (stanzas that may be collected together into single poems). For example, in the ballad (common) meter, there are fourline stanzas, each of which has two pairs of a line in iambic tetrameter (four iambic syllables) followed by a line in iambic trimeter (three iambic syllables). The example below is the first stanza of a well-known ballad, “Amazing Grace,” by John Newton3: 3

“Common metre,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_metre; accessed July 2013.

Chapter Thirteen

232

Line Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, That saved a wretch like me! I once was lost, but now am found, Was blind, but now I see

Poetic Meter ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ (஋ is an unstressed syllable, ƍ is a stressed syllable) ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ ஋ƍ

Comments The first line of an iambic tetrameter

The line of trimeter. The rhymes usually fall on this line The second tetrameter line, this time rhymed with the first line The final trimeter line of the stanza

Let us now address the syntax of another sign-system: the system employed to represent chemical reactions. In this case, we also find the same syntactic levels: the morphology level consists of the nomenclature signs of the chemical elements; the syntagmatic level relates to the use of these signs to designate molecules; the sentence level is the signs on the left sides of the equations; and, finally, the text level is the complete reaction. As with the other systems we have looked at, the text level may include a number of reactions (texts) joined together. The one thing that distinguishes the syntactic elements of this sign-system from the cases we discussed previously is that the text is presented in the form of a diagram. As a result, this sign-system has a much greater level of abstractness, and therefore its signs are more specific and its syntactic levels are more defined than those of the other systems we have been dealing with. That is, the sign-system used for diagramming chemical reactions has the same syntactic levels as the linguistic and poetic signs systems, but these levels are ex-

Levels of Syntactic Rules

233

pressed using indicators that have a greater degree of abstraction. This excerpt from a Wikipedia article about the types of chemical reactions illustrates how the syntax of this signsystem is built.4 Chemical reaction types Four basic types

Representation of four basic chemical reactions types: synthesis, decomposition, single replacement and double replacement.

Synthesis reaction In a synthesis reaction, two or more simple substances combine to form a more complex substance. These reactions are in the general form:

A + B ĺ AB 4

“Chemical reaction,” under the subheading “Reaction types,” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chemical_reaction; accessed June 2013.

234

Chapter Thirteen

Two or more reactants yielding one product is another way to identify a synthesis reaction. One example of a synthesis reaction is the combination of iron and sulfur to form iron (II) sulfide:

8Fe + S8 ĺ 8FeS Another example is simple hydrogen gas combined with simple oxygen gas to produce a more complex substance, such as water.

Decomposition reaction A decomposition reaction is the opposite of a synthesis reaction, where a more complex substance breaks down into its more simple parts. These reactions are in the general form:

AB ĺ A + B One example of a decomposition reaction is the electrolysis of water to make oxygen and hydrogen gas:

2H2O ĺ 2H2 + O2 Single replacement In a single replacement reaction, a single uncombined element replaces another in a compound; in order words, one element trades places with another element in a compound. These reactions come in the general form of:

A + BC ĺ AC + B One example of a single displacement reaction is when magnesium replaces hydrogen in water to make magnesium hydroxide and hydrogen gas:

Levels of Syntactic Rules

235

Mg + 2H2O ĺ Mg(OH)2 + H2 Double replacement In a double replacement reaction, the anions and cations of two compounds switch places and form two entirely different compounds. These reactions are in the general form:

AB + CD ĺ AD + CB For example, when barium chloride (BaCl2) and magnesium sulfate (MgSO4) reaction, the SO42- anion switches places with the 2Cl- anion, giving the compounds BaSO4 and MgCl2. Another example of a double displacement reaction is the reaction of lead (II) nitrate with potassium iodide to form lead (II) iodide and potassium nitrate:

Pb(NO3)2 + 2KI ĺ Pbi2 + 2KNO3 As you see, the same levels of syntax are evident in different sign-systems, but they differ significantly from application to application, depending on what their signs denote.

CHAPTER FOURTEEN SEMIOTIC FIELDS, FRAGMENTS, AND ORIENTATION MARKS

Before we begin to construct a new sign-system, we must have a clear image of what we want to accomplish with it and how it will help us achieve these goals. In many cases, this is not an easy matter. At the outset of the process, we cannot usually foresee exactly what we will be able to create in the end. We are still uncertain about the true natures of the objects we want to encode with the signs we will create, and thus only have a very vague idea of what the final product will be like. Historically, this lack of clarity has caused the development of some very prominent sign-systems to drag on for centuries and even millennia. A good example of this is the prolonged process that honed the stave system used in modern musical notation. Bringing a new sign-system to fruition on the first attempt is truly a rare occurrence that can best be ascribed to good fortune. Once we have developed a substantive outline of a new sign-system, we can start fleshing it out in a sketch or a blueprint. At this stage, we must conceptualize a solid syntactic foundation for the system we intend to construct. This foundation should include the following three elements: a) a semiotic field for the system; b) characterization of the main fragments of the semiotic field; and c) identification of a number of signs that are suitable for the system, along with a method for distributing those signs among the fragments of the semiotic field. Together, these three elements create a framework in

Semiotic Fields, Fragments, and Orientation Marks

237

which the sign-system can come to life. The rest of this chapter contains a more detailed explication of these three elements.

Semiotic fields and their properties The term semiotic field denotes the territory in which a sign-system is valid and works. It may be very small (a semiotic model of an atom, for example), or very large, like a linguistic system that is in common use. In some systems, like mathematical or logical systems, it can even be boundless. A semiotic field may be very structured, but it may also have no structure at all. I have already touched upon the topic of semiotic fields,1 but in this chapter I want to examine the notion in much more detail. Let us begin with examples of semiotic fields that have no bounds or borders. This often occurs in systems that have a very low level of abstraction, and is especially common in natural and iconic systems. There are numerous operational sign-systems – systems that are part of everyday life – for which we cannot define a semiotic field and, as a result, we cannot delineate the ways signs can be processed in these semiotic fields. All we can do, a priori, is formulate some very vague rules. Because of this, for example, it is rather difficult to spell out exactly how to make use of public bus systems in unfamiliar places, because we do not know many aspects of the concrete situations in these places. We only know the basic rules that apply to public bus systems in general; we know that we must pay a fare in order to ride a bus, but such important details as what the fare is; how to pay the fare; whether we need to buy tickets in advance, and, if so, where to buy the tickets and how to validate them, must be left open until we are actually on the spot. The same is true of the pro1

See “Signs that depict a semiotic field or its fragments,” page 126.

238

Chapter Fourteen

cess of buying things in shops, and of millions of other common actions we perform in everyday life. In these situations, we can only prepare ourselves by obtaining information of a general and imprecise character. Thus, although I often go to the woods to gather mushrooms or berries, every time I do so, I come across a different situation with which I must cope, and my previous experience may or may not be helpful in the current circumstances. To be sure, I can improve my situation before I enter the woods, to some extent, by learning about the signs I can use to orient myself: about orientation by the sun during the daytime or by the stars at night, about how to identify directions by looking for clues on trees, etc. But I cannot fully prepare myself in advance. Semiotic theory about potential signs is very relevant to the example of the walk in the woods. The theory of potential signs is built on the supposition that every object can, in certain circumstances, become a sign that we can use – that we ourselves endow objects with the properties of signs and then use them as such. Imagine a situation in which we are lost in the woods and cannot find our way out. You then see a tall tree or a hill, climb up, and see a possible route out of the woods. As soon as you identify the route, you single out dozens of different objects along the route that you think will serve as helpful landmarks when you return to the ground and attempt to follow the route to safety. You then climb back down and begin to look for the signs you chose from above. At that very point, the status of those things changes from potential signs to real signs that you utilize. Actually, it is more accurate to say that, in a situation like the one described above, what we are really doing is selecting one option out of many – one set of landmarks out of numerous possible sets. Every sign-system is only one of many possible sign-systems that could have been created for the same

Semiotic Fields, Fragments, and Orientation Marks

239

purpose, some of which would inevitably have proven to be more successful than others in helping us achieve this goal. Using a compass does not always guarantee success in finding our way; it cannot give us absolute assurance that by using it we will find the best route. But without it we are bound to be lost. The tools we use, along with our own ingenuity, are the most important factors affecting how likely we are to find the coveted way out of a problem. In our case, the tools are the signs and sign-systems we choose to employ. And if we want to arrive at a successful outcome, it is very important to ensure that the signs we use possess the right information and present it in a manner that is completely clear to us, the human interpreters of the signs. From the very beginning of our civilization, these needs for comprehensiveness and clarity were the main impetuses for the invention and development of ever more effective signsystems. One of the most effective means of ensuring these needs are met as much as possible by a particular sign-system is to define its semiotic field correctly. Sign-systems at the extremes of the sign-system taxonomy – at the lowest and the highest levels – do not include formal definitions of their semiotic fields. In natural systems, which are at the bottom level, the signs are too closely entwined with reality to have clearly defined semiotic fields; the particulars of reality are too unpredictable to allow for a precise definition. Under these circumstances, we must leave a lot of space in the system for potential signs, and we cannot decide in advance about their potencies and properties. At the other end of the spectrum, the sign-systems are so abstract that they can be applied to nearly all possible situations. Of course, whenever one of these systems is applied in a particular situation, the semiotic field is defined specifically for that situation, and then its scope becomes clear, but this cannot be done in advance.

240

Chapter Fourteen

For all of the sign-systems in between the two extremes, the semiotic fields are defined as much as possible. There are standard semiotic fields for some systems, like games (chess, basketball, etc.), which are explicitly enumerated in concrete terms with all appropriate details. Some standard semiotic fields are so large that they cannot be reproduced in reality and are presented in semiotic models. Thus, the semiotic field of geo-cartography is our planet. It cannot be copied in its true dimensions, and, in any case, it would be quite useless to do so, so it is squeezed into various scaled cartographic models, and each model has its own rules for representing the semiotic field. In more abstract systems, the semiotic field has the dimensions of the system itself and of its potential audience. Thus, the semiotic field of a national language is defined by its own characteristics and by its expected audience. For each audience, the system is given specific dimensions and depth (that is, the logic of application2 is changed).

Fragments in the semiotic field Large semiotic fields are usually divided into fragments, each of which has its own properties. A chess board is a semiotic field that is divided into 64 squares (32 red or white and 32 black). Each square is a fragment of the semiotic field, and together they compose the whole semiotic field. Each square has a nomination that is constructed from the numbers and letters located on the margins of the board. These nominations are used to chronicle the course of chess or checkers games in the standard notation systems used for each of these games. In this example, the fragments are all equal in size and identical in shape, but this is not always the case. A basketball court, for example, is divided into unequal zones – two zones at either end of the court, adjacent to the baskets, and one central 2

See “Logic of application,” page 195.

Semiotic Fields, Fragments, and Orientation Marks

241

zone covering the rest of the court. Each of the zones serves different aims and has different properties. There are systems in which the fragments are built using mathematical calculations. Thus, the semiotic fields of maps of the planet Earth are divided into fragments formed by parallels and meridians. The divisions are constructed in accordance with mathematical projections that make it possible to depict the round Earth in two-dimensional space. The fragments of one of these maps are not all equal to one another. Each one includes different signs, depending both on the objects that belong to it and on the purpose of the particular map in which it appears. If the map presents the physical properties of the Earth, the signs will be those that are useful for that purpose. If it is a meteorological map, it will use different signs, even though the same fragments will appear in the semiotic field. Similarly, a political map would require yet another set of signs. Fragments are common in systems with low degrees of abstraction – that is, in systems that reflect aspects of ontological reality. In systems of higher abstraction, which relate to semiotic reality, fragments do not exist. Abstract systems reflect our mental images of ontology and are built on logic and syntax. That is why we must use syntactic aids or logical instructions to explain our innovative ideas. I call signs that serve these purposes links. Links appear in all types of highly abstract systems, including mathematical and formalized ones. In mathematical equations, chemical reaction, and the like, links take the form of images like arrows, straight and curved dashes, and logical operators like “and so on” or “if… then…”. They play various roles: joining our thoughts, separating them, comparing them, etc. Punctuation marks in systems of writing also belong to this category of signs. It is interesting to note that a single link may fill quite different and even contrasting functions simultaneously. For

242

Chapter Fourteen

example, the slash in and/or both divides and joins the other two elements of this merger.

Orientation marks The third component of the syntactic framework is what I call orientation marks. Orientation marks play a decisive role in the functioning of systems throughout those systems’ existence and in all of their variations. Consider, for example, geographical maps. Every map has borders that enclose and define its semiotic field, and this field is divided into fragments by means of parallels and meridians, as we explained above. But, in addition to these things, a map must also have internal binders that complete its structure and identify its orientation and proportions. These requirements are met by a wind rose, which aligns the map with the four directions, and a map scale, which defines the final dimensions of all the denotational signs. These two sign features appear in all kinds of maps and have the same forms regardless of the kind of map (physical, political, historical, etc.). Bear in mind that the purpose of orientation marks is not to orient real-life referents (their orientations are given to us a priori), but to correctly place signs within the framework of a particular sign-system. It is to be expected that the orientation of the signs will match the orientation of the referents, but ensuring this is not the purpose of the orientation marks. Let us consider another example of a sign-system that makes use of orientation marks: musical notation. There are musical scores for different instruments and vocal performances, but each one has the standard musical stave (five parallel lines, which form the semiotic field they all share), beats separated by bars (to create fragments), and clefs, time signatures, and composer’s remarks. (These remarks are usually expressed in Italian words like moderato or vivace.) The latter three items are the orientation marks that give the notation

Semiotic Fields, Fragments, and Orientation Marks

243

system its inner complexity and functionality. Note again that all of these signs are common to all types of musical notation and remain fixed in all variations of a particular piece of music. Orientation marks are characteristic not only of notations, but also of other kinds of systems. Consider the insignia of military ranks. They all have the same semiotic field: the uniform on which they are displayed. Each type of insignia has a special place on the uniform where it should be displayed – shoulders, sleeves, collar, hatband; these locations are the fragments of the semiotic field. The detailed requirements of what exactly should be placed in each of these positions – stars, braided cords, ribbons, etc. – are the orientation marks.

The role of geometric figures in defining semiotic fields The aim of geometry is to present idealized forms of particular shapes and other constructs, and to analyze the properties of these objects. Nonetheless, over the course of human civilization, people have found other applications for various geometric figures. In particular, geometric figures have been used as indicators in semiotic fields that are otherwise unrelated to geometry. In these cases, geometric figures usually define the boundaries of a semiotic field or help us explain certain abstract features of an object we are studying. For example, in the social sciences and many other areas of study, a circle is often used to build a semiotic space in which to place data of a particular kind. The circle may contain any type of data – perhaps the results of the last elections, or data about the population of some region. The only meaning of the circle is to provide a defined space for the information placed in it. In essence, the circle means, “herein is 100% of the data.” The circle is chosen for this purpose because it presents

244

Chapter Fourteen

the information in a very compact and clearly understood manner. Even so, this method of presenting information does have a drawback: only a small quantity of information can be inserted into a circle. That is why we usually only place simple values, like percentages, in circles. To present more data, we use another geometric figure: a table. The cells of a table can be any size, so we can make them the size we need to contain the information we want to put into them. Different types of tables can be used for a range of purposes, and they are very common in every branch of study. Geometric figures of greater significance and profundity than circles and tables also exist. These figures do not only demarcate spaces for data; their structures also add meaning to the material they present. Examples of such figures are triangles that illustrate tripartite relationships, tree figures that visually convey hierarchic structures, and graphs of curves of various types. In this very book, I used different kinds of triangles to demonstrate the meanings of various signs. In biology, tree figures have been used to show the evolution and mutations of living organisms over time. Tree figures may be drawn upward from the base, or downward from the top, depending on the information the tree is intended to convey. Many variations of figures can be used for this same purpose – to demonstrate the direction and transmutations of different processes. Most processes of these types can be illustrated with geometric figures; over time, this method has become more and more popular among scientific researchers. One of the central concepts in my semiotic studies – the growth of signs along the parameter of degree of abstraction – is demonstrated in this book in the form of a pyramid (see the sign-system taxonomy in figure 8-1 on page 130). The form of this diagram adds additional meaning to the information it presents: it not only “demonstrates,” but also patently explains

Semiotic Fields, Fragments, and Orientation Marks

245

how the growth it illustrates took place. Each higher level of signs in the diagram not only represents a more advanced level, it also subsumes the previous levels, stimulating them to further development, and then, in turn, drawing upon their growth to expand itself further. In general, we have often mentioned signs that help us penetrate to the depths of otherwise hidden properties. Geometric figures are an example of such signs.

Syntactic framework of Morse code One final example of the three components of syntactic frameworks, which I find particularly instructive, is Morse code. When Samuel Morse invented his electrical telegraph system in the middle of the 19th century, he also developed the sign-system of dots and dashes that was used to encode it. Designing the code was not an easy matter, as it was constrained by the technical capabilities of the telegraph system he invented. The coded text had to be marked on a paper tape, because that kind of tape was the only thing that could be fed into the machine. Thus, the paper tape was the semiotic field of the Morse-code sign-system. The idea of encoding the English alphabet was also natural – how else can you communicate in writing by telegraph? Thus, the semiotic field was divided into fragments of letters, words, sentences, etc. The stroke of genius was to use different intervals between these fragments; each of these intervals was defined in proportion to the time required to produce a dot with the telegraph key: Each character (letter or numeral) is represented by a unique sequence of dots and dashes. The duration of a dash is three times the duration of a dot. Each dot or dash is followed by a short interval, equal to the dot duration. The letters of a word are separated by a space equal to three dots (one dash), and the words are separated by a space equal to seven dots.

246

Chapter Fourteen

The dot duration is the basic unit of time measurement in code transmission. The duration of a dot serves as an orientation mark that enables the system to function coherently.

A note on terminology In the last few chapters, I have intentionally included many new terms which have never been used before in the ways I have employed them. All of these terms are my own creations. I am aware of the fact that most of them will likely be changed in the future or will just disappear from use. Nevertheless, in view of the fact that I am attempting to create a new branch of scientific knowledge, I felt I had no choice but to give names to the things I was speaking about. A glossary of the new terms – there are now more than 150 of them – appears at the end of this book. But I have also endeavored to introduce and explain the new terms when I used them in the main body of the book.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN TYPES OF SIGN-SYSTEMS

Overlapping types of sign-systems At this point, I want to return to my diagram of signsystem taxonomy (see figure 8-1 on page 130), because I want to show how separate sign-systems converge into types. In that diagram, I presented six different types of sign-systems. Each type is founded on a distinct taxon, which, on the one hand, is characterized by the type of basic sign employed by its sign-systems, but which, on the other hand, comprises quite a variety of discrete sign-systems. The taxons are arranged hierarchically according to the gradual increase in the degree of abstraction of the signs and sign-systems belonging to them. Now that we are much better versed in the characteristics of sign-systems, we can more easily comprehend the roles of the various types of sign-systems identified in the taxonomy. Let me begin by presenting the same list of taxons, but with different arrows connecting them together; instead of the single-headed arrows, I will now use double-headed arrows: natural signs ļ images ļ words ļ graphemes ļ some kinds of symbols I did this to underscore an important fact about what takes place every time a new type of sign-system, one whose signs are of greater abstraction than those of the previously existing systems, was introduced into human culture. Not only did

248

Chapter Fifteen

these new systems widen the range of human mental capabilities, they also helped to generate further development within the sign-systems that already existed. In other words, when people progressed to presenting things by means of images, they not only added a new kind of weapon to their arsenal of mental resources, they also increased the potency of the natural sign-systems that were in use previously. These latter systems remained natural in their essence, but when new signs were added to them, they frequently included elements of an iconic character. Similarly, with the inception of language systems, elements of language systems were incorporated into the pre-existing iconic and natural systems; and this pattern of enriching the older, established types of systems continued with later advances in sign-system abstraction. In this way, natural signs remained natural but, at the same time, they also increased their degree of abstraction and acquired new qualities. Let us illustrate this notion by looking at the history of arithmetic. Arithmetic is undoubtedly a mathematical signsystem. It is lower in abstraction than other mathematical systems, but it is definitely mathematical in its essence; it has symbols as its basic signs, and they are managed in accordance with specific rules of the kind found in highly abstract systems. Nonetheless, although this is what it looks like today, over its history, arithmetic developed from lower to higher levels of abstraction. At first, arithmetic was managed like a typical natural signsystem, and its signs were natural objects: people just took as many things as they thought they needed or was their due. The next stage was what we would call iconic: people represented numbers by using substitutes – by assembling a collection of other objects, but in the quantity whose number they were representing. They usually used fingers and toes, stones, or other readily available substitutes, for this purpose. Tribes

Types of Sign-Systems

249

in which this kind of counting is employed are still extant, and we ourselves very often represent small numbers with our fingers. This way of counting freed us from dealing with real objects, because it enabled people to denote numbers in the absence of the articles they were counting. It was only after this that humans invented words for numbers. Developing number words allowed us to designate any quantity by means of a specific indicator. This innovation distanced arithmetic signs from ontology even further, but made it possible for people to indicate numbers that could not be shown using substitutions. Once number words were well established, the final stage of arithmetic development came about, when mathematical notations of arithmetic transformations were invented. These notations established arithmetic as an actual science. From the standpoint of semiotics, the stages of the development of arithmetic exemplify the overlapping of abstraction in sign-system types. Imagine that each type of signsystem develops from left to right; namely, systems with minimal abstraction are concentrated on the left and the type expands towards the right. The most advanced systems in any type, those with the maximum degree of abstraction, are thus to be found on the right. In this arrangement, systems on the right side of one level may be further to the right (i.e., have a greater degree of abstraction) than some systems on the left side of higher levels. Thus, for example, spectroscopy, which was invented by Robert Bunsen in 1855, definitely belongs to natural sign-systems, since it demonstrates properties of reallife substances. Yet in terms of the level of abstraction of its signs, it is higher than most of the simple images that are placed in the second layer of the diagram.

Chapter Fifteen

250

Formalized sign-systems Notational sign-systems Language sign-systems Iconic sign-systems Natural sign-systems Lower abstraction

Higher abstraction

Figure 15-1

I would like to add a few words about the significance of the diagram above as a kind of geometric visualization of the development of human logic. When we think, we consciously or subconsciously follow an organizational pattern for navigating our ponderings. I have come to the conclusion that we can formally represent these patterns using geometrical figures like the one presented here. The diagram illustrates how we acquire knowledge with the help of signs and their systems. At first, we build the simplest sign-systems (natural systems). Then we advance to iconic systems, which are more abstract and complicated. But we need not complete the construction of natural systems before initiating the next stage of sign development. We introduce iconic systems while we are still explicating and mastering – even just partially mastering – the meaning of the previous stage. This gives us the opportunity not only to advance to a more progressive stage of thinking, but also to boost the preceding stage to new heights. The natural sign-systems in our example become more advanced and sophisticated under

Types of Sign-Systems

251

the influence of new steps we take when we introduce new levels of sign abstraction. This is a second aspect of the development of signs and sign-systems that is no less important than the addition of new levels of thinking. The geometrical representation of our intellectual maturation in the diagram above can be applied not only in semiotics, but in many other areas of human intellectual growth. It is adapted from the works of Jean Piaget, from the way he built his successive schemata of children’s mental development.1 The overlap of different types of sign-systems greatly complicates the comparative analysis of sign-systems as well as the identification of the type of system a particular signsystem really belongs to. Note that this is not just a theoretical point, because it also has very serious practical implications. For example, we are currently witnessing a very important development in cartography, which concerns navigational cartography based on data from satellites. Present day cartographers were all taught the basics of earth cartography as it was formerly implemented, and they are accustomed to building their charts using sign-systems in which the basic signs are conventional images. But now, navigational cartography has come to rely on realistic images, i.e. on pictures. When today’s cartographers examine the pictures that are sent from satellites and displayed in automobile navigators, many of them do not consider the new system to be cartography at all. They say that what we see are not images and the whole composite is not a chart. (I have heard a lot of discussions on this matter.) While we may agree that what we see is not a chart in the conventional sense of the word, the first part of this assertion is absolutely wrong. Navigational pictures 1

Marilynne Adler, “Jean Piaget, School Organization and Instruction,” in Irene J. Athey & Duane O. Rabadeau, eds., Educational Implications of Piaget’s Theory (Waltham, Massachusetts: GinnBlaisdell, 1970), pp.1-12.

252

Chapter Fifteen

include images depicting the landscape, but these images are of a simpler kind than those that appear in conventional charts. These new images resemble the objects they denote and resemble them more closely than the images that were used previously. The system is definitely a cartographic one, but it should be studied separately and approached from a different angle and with a different mathematical basis.

Appeal of particular types of sign-systems Despite what I said above, each type of sign-system includes systems that are more or less homogenous and are generally easily discernable. Over the course of time, each type has acquired specific qualities, and those qualities seem to irresistibly attract certain kinds of people. Preferences in this regard depend on the individual’s psychological make-up. Let me begin by briefly enumerating these qualities, as I see them: Natural systems attract those who incline towards the simple facts of everyday life. These are people who do not like theories and mental kinds of work, preferring the skills used to manipulate material things, and they employ these skills very effectively and with great relish. Iconic systems draw the attention of people who have a bent for characterizing things that already exist. People in this class like to depict the things they find around them, and they get satisfaction from scrutinizing and portraying such things. A wide variety of arts belong to this layer of sign-systems, and there is a large group of people who are immersed in art in all its varieties. Language systems engage those who like to explain things. Languages are optimized for explaining all aspects of the world. They are vast because they include names for all objects, facts, and phenomena in the world – in both ontological and semiotic realities – and all their properties and ties. Note that every sign, in every sphere of life, has its equivalent in

Types of Sign-Systems

253

language; all figures, all numbers, all chemical elements, etc., have their own linguistic nominations. I shall expand later on some additional aspects of this phenomenon. Notations are irresistible to those who like to systematize, to put things together and analyze them in detail from every side and aspect. Formalized and math systems employ those talented people who navigate abstract and theoretical matters like fish swim in water. These are individuals who are often helpless in practical affairs, but are deeply immersed in intellectual deliberation. Systems of these types are the most distant from the things their signs designate, so manipulations within them may reveal the deepest laws of our existence, and their conclusions are widely implemented in different walks of life. The descriptions above are very concise and limited. Yet they seem sufficient to cover the main types of human psychology, and the need most people have to hone their way of life to suit their temperament. It even seems that scientists use these categories as guidelines when they compose IQ tests. It is just that the sign component of the process was never clearly articulated until now. I propose including it in the discussion.

The role of languages in the hierarchy of sign-system types In the hierarchy of sign-system types I am presenting, language systems play a special role. Admittedly, the same thing could also be said of every level in the diagram. Nevertheless, language really does play a special part. Alongside its role of giving expression to all of our impressions and feelings, language serves as the interpreter for all the other signs in all the sign-systems in existence, regardless of their type. I have already spoken about this fact, but it is worthwhile to elucidate

254

Chapter Fifteen

it here, too. Every sign, in every sign-system, has an additional nomination in language; and conversely, no other single sign-system can boast of containing as great a variety of signs as each language does. Why is it so? I would like to propose my own understanding of this fact: the capacity to interpret other signs derives from the degree of abstraction of words. If you look at our taxonomy diagram once more, you will see that language systems occupy the middle position in the hierarchy of all existing signs. Words, which are the basic signs of languages, obtain such quanta of abstraction that they can easily be employed to explain and evaluate all other signs, both signs with lower quanta of abstraction and signs with higher quanta of abstraction than the words themselves. That is why all non-linguistic signs are repeated in languages and can subsequently be elucidated with words. And this is what really happens in everyday sign usage. What is elucidation or interpretation? It is the presentation of something in a simpler form that is clearer to our minds. In mathematics, the fraction 326/489 is not intelligible; but if we simplify it by dividing both its numerator and its denominator by 163, we get 2/3. Once we have done so, it immediately becomes intelligible and patent to our minds; that is, we can easily imagine it. So, if we translate every sign into linguistic units, and then interpret it using other words, we can understand everything that is going on in every other sign-system. This also explains why we use equations for sign transformations in mathematics (as well as in other sciences, like physics and chemistry): they simplify the initial data and make it intelligible to our minds. At the outset of this process, the data becomes clear to specialists in its raw form. For laymen, it is transferred into words and elucidated by means of a linguistic system.

Types of Sign-Systems

255

The role of languages as general interpreters is fulfilled in the following way. If a language interprets a system whose signs have a lower degree of abstraction than the language itself has, it automatically raises the signs’ level of abstraction to the level of the language. Sometimes, this process is not necessary and only complicates the situation. For instance, some gestures are self-explanatory, and verbal intervention undermines their meaning instead of clarifying it. On the other hand, if a language is used to interpret actions in systems whose level of abstraction is higher than that of words, it lowers their quantum of abstraction, in the process I call the release of excessive abstraction. Now, this role that language systems play – the elucidation of the semiotic contents of all the other sign-systems – has led to some blunders in the development of semiotics as a special science. The problem can be traced back to Ferdinand de Saussure (1857–1913), one of the fathers of modern semiotics. De Saussure was an outstanding linguist who lectured on general linguistics at the University of Geneva. In his Course in General Linguistics,2 he declared that a language can be analyzed as a system of signs, and, because of this, it can be treated as part of the new branch of science he had conceived, which he called semiology (today’s semiotics). In his opinion, linguistics should be treated as a part of semiology. De Saussure wrote that, “when semiology becomes organized as a science, the question will arise whether or not it properly includes modes of expression based on completely natural signs, such as pantomime.” Having come to the con2

Actually, this book was compiled by De Saussure’s students, Charles Bally and Albert Sechehaye, from notes on lectures he gave at the University of Geneva between 1906 and 1911. It is available on the internet at: http://www.archive.org/stream/courseingenerall00saus/courseingen erall00saus_djvu.txt (accessed August 2013).

256

Chapter Fifteen

clusion that words in languages are distinct entities, most of which are arbitrary and established by convention, he adds: “Signs that are wholly arbitrary realize better than others the ideal of the semiological process; that is why language is the most complex and universal of all systems of expression.” The Course in General Linguistics was published in 1916 and quickly became established as a groundbreaking work in the field. It revolutionized modern linguistics and spawned a general interest in semiotics. But his remark that language is “the most complex and universal of all systems of expressions” was acclaimed by his followers as the primary semiotic principle. It gave rise to what is commonly known as “linguistic semiotics”. In linguistic semiotics, all semiotic systems were treated as emerging from languages, and a new hierarchy of systems was created, in which all non-linguistic systems were ranked as “secondary” or “tertiary” systems relative to languages. In my opinion, this is the wrong way to approach semiotic systems. The origins of all types of sign-systems are completely independent of one another; although they may later depend on other types of systems, they do not arise from any of those other types of systems. The human mind matures by gradually acquiring each type of sign-system as a new stage in its growth, subsuming the previous stages and at the same time giving them additional stimuli for further development. This is much more complex than a simple linear succession of sign-systems developing one upon the other, but it is what takes place in reality. We will continue this discussion in the next part of the book, where we look at various types of reality.

PART IV. ON SEMIOTIC REALITY

At the beginning of this century, I proposed a new semiotic concept called semiotic reality.1 The concept grew out of the two most basic notions of semiotics – the sign and the signsystem – and served as a supplement to them. Already in the first article I devoted to the concept of semiotic reality, I tried to define its essence and delineate its boundaries and chief characteristics. Since then, I have used the concept in numerous publications, each time widening its scope and expanding on its traits. I think that the time is ripe to summarize my understanding of semiotic reality, since it has become one of the three cornerstones of the maturing science of semiotics (namely, the sign, the sign-system, and semiotic reality) and is treated as if its meaning is “obvious” – as if it is understood inherently – in various scientific contexts. In spite of its seeming simplicity, its meaning has a lot of diverse nuances and intricacies, as I will demonstrate and explain in this part of the book.

1

Some people have assumed that the concept of semiotic reality is an offshoot of the semiosphere idea that was introduced into scientific discourse by Juri Lotman. This is not the case. The concept of the semiosphere has very different connotations from my concept of semiotic reality, and was applied in significantly different ways.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN WHAT IS SEMIOTIC REALITY?

An initial approach to defining semiotic reality When I use the term “semiotic reality,” I mean “the sum total of all the signs and sign-systems that have been produced by humanity throughout its existence.” These signs and signsystems were all created as part of people’s endeavors to understand ontological (objective) reality and accommodate it to human needs. That is, the phenomenon of semiotic reality came into existence, first and foremost, as a result of our efforts to understand our surroundings and to adapt ourselves to them, and, secondly and conversely, to alter them, if possible, to the advantage of the human race. It follows that semiotic reality is exclusively the fruit of the human mind and human strivings. By contrast, ontological reality is initially given to us “ready-made,” as it were. Another quality of semiotic reality, one that derives from what I have already said, is that semiotic reality exists and develops in accordance with very different rules from those that apply to ontological reality. Because of this, we can use it and change it much more easily than we can use and change the ontological plane that corresponds to it. To explain this assertion, I will tell you a simple story about something that happened to me recently. Last summer, I decided to teach my 13-year old grandson some geography, because he had not studied any at school yet. So I took a map of Israel, where we both live, showed him the borders of the country, and asked him to name the place where we were. He

What Is Semiotic Reality?

259

answered correctly that it was Jerusalem. I showed him the point designating Jerusalem on the map, and explained the map, and mapping in general, to him. Then I began asking him about other cities and places in the country, places whose names he already knew and that he had even visited himself. To be sure, my grandson “knew” all of these places, in the sense that he remembered them all, but he could not find them on the map. Of course, this came as no surprise to me. The two mental images – the real settlements and landscapes, on the one hand, and their geographic denotations on the map, on the other hand, were not only disconnected in his mind; they also interfered with and contradicted one another. To find a location on the map, he had to internalize the semiotic view of the area and incorporate it with the ontological representations he already had. This is a process that requires a lot of time and patience. I cite this simple, somewhat primitive, example in order to demonstrate a very important fact about the different natures of the two concurrent realities, objective reality and semiotic reality. Although they denote one and the same thing, they describe it in completely different ways. This fact is reflected in the way humanity struggled to invent cartography as a means for representing geographic phenomena. The development of cartography was a process that took a great deal of time and effort; in fact, to this day, it continues to demand a tremendous effort to accustom children to this new picture of things that are already familiar to them. Obviously, not only are the two representations utterly disparate, the logic of coping with them is also different: in one, we must find a road in a real environment, while in the other we must find it in the corresponding map. Thus, a third kind of logic must be used to adjust one’s thinking in order to integrate the first type of representation with the second.

260

Chapter Sixteen

The example above highlights another important point: semiotic reality consists of signs that are often gathered together in sign-systems. Behind each of these signs and signsystems, some particular aspect of human activity can always be found. That is why every individual sign or sign-system must be understood not only in terms of its structure and the laws that govern its manipulation, but also with reference to the human enterprise that it was created to advance. The structure of a sign-system, and the rules that govern it, may be simple and inconspicuous, even when the human activity behind them is vital for our safety and longevity in this world. Take, for example, a system like the system of traffic lights, which regulates our movements at street corners. The device of the traffic-light box is very simple, and so is the semiotic content of this sign-system. It consists of the three lights: red (which means that crossing the street is forbidden), yellow (which indicates we are waiting for the next sign), and green (which tells us we are permitted to start moving across the street). These lights change regularly in a fixed pattern. The sequence can be understood even by very young children; in fact, we can see parents teaching their children to obey the lights at a very tender age. Nevertheless, the simplicity of the system should not deceive us about its importance for humans everywhere, especially in towns and cities. As you can see from this example, every sign and every sign-system has both pure semiotic content and a human context. In order to understand it properly, we must take both aspects into account.

How semiotic reality is created As I mentioned above, semiotic reality comes into existence in the course of our dealings with ontological reality. The diagram below illustrates the process by which it comes into existence and the interactions between ontological and

What Is Semiotic Reality?

261

semiotic realities. I call this process the transmutation of existential events:

How Semiotic Reality Is Built 1. Ontological Reality (The First and Second-Nature)

3. Practical activity

5. Arts

4. Science

6. Mythology, religion, ideology

7. Education

2. Semiotic Reality (Signs and Sign-Systems) Figure 16-1

When we are born, we find ourselves in the world of ontological reality (no. 1 in the diagram), a world that exists independently of us and to which we have to adapt in order to live comfortably. In order to adapt to our ontological reality, we begin to study it, both at school and by ourselves. This acquisition of knowledge, and the drawing of conclusions from it about ontological reality, proceeds with the help of signs. The crystallization of our thoughts is accomplished using signs – words, pictures, maps, diagrams, etc. – to elucidate them. All cultural creations – literature, ballet, sculpture, and so forth – are infused with signs. Our scientific investigations are per-

262

Chapter Sixteen

formed using signs and their systems, and the results are also expressed in signs. All of these signs and sign-systems are gathered together in the special plane of our lives that I call semiotic reality (no. 2 in the diagram). The whole of semiotic reality is subdivided into many types of human activity, each with its own subject-matter and its own rules for dealing with its signs. Thus, our attempts to accommodate ourselves to our surroundings produce new data not only in the general collection of semiotic assets (no. 2), but also in specific departments that collect the signs we need for the particular kind of activity they deal with. For this reason, in the diagram, this data appears in two places: in no. 2, and also in the specific branch of knowledge to which it belongs (nos. 3-7). Compartmentalizing semiotic reality helps us to keep track of and locate the information we need for a given purpose. Semiotic reality allows us to detach signs from the real things they represent so that we can manipulate them in our minds. That is, we can transform signs in order to acquire new knowledge about the things they represent. If the signs we use were chosen well for the tasks at hand, and the rules we use to transform them are appropriate, we can gain new knowledge about reality itself by transforming signs within semiotic reality. Once we have acquired the necessary knowledge and techniques, we can also use semiotic reality to help us adapt ontological reality to better suit our needs. Indeed, to some degree, we can change ontological reality in this way. In fact, the ontological reality we face today is quite different from the ontological reality that humans encountered when our species first walked the earth. We can say that ontological reality has two facets, its original facet, which I call its first nature, and that which is added to it, which I call its second nature. Every generation of people encounters a different stage of ontological reality, and ac-

What Is Semiotic Reality?

263

cepts it as a complete whole. They learn about their particular stage and then introduce further changes and improvements to it. Thus, over time, the ontology experienced by people undergoes an endless process of modification. This interplay between semiotic reality and ontological reality is represented in the diagram by the double-tipped arrows.

The forms of signs in semiotic reality The entire process we have just described, the perpetual human study of ontological reality and expansion of semiotic reality, is founded on something very basic: signs. Let us return again to this core concept and look at signs themselves and how they are related to semiotic reality. As we have noted earlier, signs can exist either as separate, single entities or as elements that are included in signsystems. There is great difference between these two types of signs. An isolated sign can occur only if it is similar to its referent, or linked to it clearly and unambiguously by the surrounding situation. Otherwise, signs must be supported by the sign-systems in which they are included. Numerous single signs exist. For example, single signs can represent referents, if they are samples taken from those referents or if they are clearly recognizable images of those referents. Thus, in a collection of items, such as a collection of plants or rocks, a single sample may represent a whole class of similar items. Similarly, a photo of a person in a passport is a clearly recognizable image that represents that person. In both of these cases, the situation makes the meaning of the sign clear. When it is removed from its context, the sign becomes meaningless. Sometimes, the situation can have the same effect even when a sign does not resemble its referent. For example, the image of a lightning bolt (a zigzag arrow) on an electric pole tells anyone who is considering climbing the pole that there is

264

Chapter Sixteen

a risk of electrocution. Still, this situation can only give meaning to the sign if the person viewing it has a certain amount of previous knowledge about the subject, even if it is an almost insignificant amount. The same is true of the 00 sign that is used in some places to designate a lavatory. A person who is not familiar with the sign would not know what it means. This last example also demonstrates the fact that there are no separate signs that are known to all human beings in the world, because there are always limitations on their dissemination. Separate signs can be relatively better known or relatively less well-known, but they cannot be universally known. The more important a particular separate sign is for humanity, the more persistently it is disseminated over an ever-growing area. Consider, for example, the unit of length called the meter. At first, this unit did not exist. Every country had its own units of length, which were usually derived from readily available objects that were easy to use for measuring, like a foot or a forearm. It soon became obvious that such units were not exact enough, because they were different for each human being and were also easily falsified. People then tried to establish a more reliable unit of measurement. The first successful attempt occurred in France during the French Revolution at the end of the 18th century. Scientists measured the length of the meridian of the Earth that passed through Paris and defined one ten-millionth of this length as a metre (meter in the US). This became the basic unit for measuring length. Since it seemed like it would be a very useful standard for measurement, the scientists made a sample of it in hard metal and kept it as a prototype for all future reproductions. It very soon became clear that the initial choice of the basis for measurement (the Paris meridian) was not thought out sufficiently. Furthermore, the new meter did not correspond to the units of length that were already in use in other countries.

What Is Semiotic Reality?

265

Thus, in the second half of the 19th century, scientists returned to the problem. The Meter Convention was convened in 1875 to discuss the issue, and it established an international organization that was charged with the task of setting an appropriate standard for units of length. After prolonged disputation, the members of this organization decided to adopt the old sample from France and make it the exact standard for the basic measurement unit. Little-by-little, and despite very significant opposition, this unit penetrated many different nations and became integrated with their cultures, until both the standard length and the sign (“meter”) became an established and undisputed standard all over the world. Its ultimate victory derived in part from the need to standardize measurements throughout the world in order to promote trade, and additionally from the migration of millions of people throughout the world – many of whom brought the metric system with them. I am dwelling at length on this topic not only in order to tell the story of how this unit of measurement came into existence and was disseminated, but also because the newly invented meter very quickly blossomed into a widespread system of signs, with the meter as its basic sign. When the concept of a meter emerged, it was immediately extended through the creation of subdivisions (decimeters, centimeters, millimeters, etc.) and larger units (decameters, hectometers, kilometers, etc.). Those who know Latin can easily discern that all these extensions belong to a single decimal system of numeration. In this way, a very practical standard of length units, one that was clear and easily understood as well as universally used, came into existence. The system could be applied in a wide variety of situations, yet at its center was the meter. That is why I call the meter the basic sign of the system. As I have pointed out several times already, the identification of basic signs in a system is a very important tool for semiotic analysis. Any sign-system can be defined once we

266

Chapter Sixteen

know its basic signs. For example, from time immemorial linguists have discussed the question of what a human language is. Dozens, if not hundreds, of definitions of the phenomenon have been proposed over the years. If we apply semiotics to this problem, by identifying the basic signs of human language sign-systems, the obstacles to formulating the definition of human language are easily overcome. Words, which have connotations outside of a language system itself, in ontological reality, are the signs we use to bring meanings into the language system, so that we can work with them within the systemic framework of the language. Words are therefore the basic signs of languages. We can use this statement to create a definition of language: A language is a sign-system whose basic signs are words. This is a clear-cut and immediately understood definition of this very complicated phenomenon. Neither morphemes nor phonemes nor any other secondary elements derived from words, but words themselves, compose the foundations of human languages of all kinds: natural human languages, artificial languages (like Esperanto and programming languages), esoteric languages like sign languages or drum languages, and so on. Behind every sound and gesture, every drum-beat and whistle, and every symbol in a computer programming language, words are hidden. It is these units that import external meanings into the semiotic framework so that they can be properly manipulated and applied linguistically. The introduction of the concept of basic signs enables us to build a hierarchy of the signs within a single system, from those signs that are simpler than the basic signs of the system to those that are more complex than its basic signs. In languages, for example, words are the basic signs, but there are also simpler signs – morphemes, phonemes, etc. – that are below words in the hierarchy. Similarly, more complex signs – syntagmas, sentences, and paragraphs – are above words. All

What Is Semiotic Reality?

267

of these signs are derivatives of words, though they themselves may also function as the basic signs of secondary linguistic subsystems. For instance, phonemes are the basic signs in phonetic transcription, which is a subsystem of language. Thus, basic signs usually exist in combination with other types of signs in sign-systems. Sign-systems can be divided into three groups, in accordance with the way their basic signs exist in combination with their other types of signs: 1. Sign-systems in which the basic signs only include nomenclature, like the Periodic Table, whose signs are symbols that merely represent elements 2. Sign-systems whose basic signs are primarily compound signs, like physical charts in cartography whose markers combine dots with place names 3. Sign-systems whose basic signs conjoin nomenclature and compound signs, as in phonetic transcriptions or musical notes In sum, sign-systems have a core system that may have offshoots. These offshoots are secondary sign-systems that can develop and can be studied as separate, autonomous systems. Our picture of secondary sign-systems will be incomplete if we do not mention the gemmation of extremes from a core system. One example of this phenomenon is the use of length measurements for extremely large or small lengths. The signsystem we described above for handling length is based on the meter and its derivatives. When it deals with cosmic distances, however, we don’t normally use this system. Instead, we use parsecs and light years. These belong to a secondary system of the metric system; parsecs and light years can also be expressed in the standard metric units, but they are very inconvenient and burdensome to write, so we use the simpler system for colossal distances. The same can be said about the

268

Chapter Sixteen

measurement units we use for the microscopic world, in which we use signs like microns and their derivatives instead of standard derivations of the meter. Correlation between the two realities Thus far, I have only discussed the formal traits of semiotic reality and how signs and their systems are represented in it. Now I want to consider a more profound matter: How do the two types of reality differ from one another in terms of how they relate to an object of study? To begin answering this question, I will start with a general statement that summarizes my answer in the simplest possible way: When we study a subject in ontological reality, or simply try to accommodate ourselves to it, we attempt to formulate a picture of it in our minds that coincides as much as possible with it or that is at least compatible with it. The more closely semiotic reality is aligned with ontological reality, the more useful it is, and, therefore, we should always attempt to coordinate the two as closely as possible. It seems obvious that if we have a false picture of something in our surroundings, we cannot utilize our knowledge properly and successfully. Of course, if our comprehension of an object we are observing only has a few small, relatively insignificant mistakes, it may meet our needs. But, even minor misconceptions can lead to complications when we apply our knowledge; while we will most likely ultimately succeed in our task despite these discrepancies, we will probably have difficulties along the way. Thus, it is best to understand the object we are studying fully and learn about it in the right sequence. However, this requires that we comply with certain rules for observing the object, for reaching correct and unambiguous conclusions from our observations, and for testing them afterwards in the real environment to which the object belongs. I will deal with all of these conditions below, but be-

What Is Semiotic Reality?

269

fore I do, I want to illustrate how I understand the ideal correspondence between an aspect of ontological reality that is being studied and its counterpart in semiotic reality. My illustration comes from the field of genetics, and is based on material that appears in Isaac Asimov’s book, The Genetic Code1: By the 1940s, biochemists understood that living organisms consisted of proteins and that proteins were composed of amino acids. They could also decipher which amino acids composed each protein, but the principles that guided how the amino acids constructed each protein were not known because they did not know how the amino acids were linked together in proteins. The mechanism that created these links was clarified by three subsequent studies that were performed in the 1940s and 1950s. The process began when Archer Martin and Richard Synge invented partition chromatography (1941), which made it possible to determine the sequences of amino acids in any given protein. Then Frederick Sanger made use of the method of partition chromatography invented by Martin and Synge, but he divided the process into a sequence of parts and studied each part separately (1953). This allowed him not only to control which amino acids were involved in the process, but also to control the bonds between them. (In 1958, Sanger was awarded the Noble prize for chemistry “for his work on the structure of proteins, especially that of insulin.”2) This chain of revelations was continued by the American biochemist Vincent du Vigneaud, who in 1955 used the same methods to reveal the exact constructions of the molecules of two important sulfur compounds. His research succeeded not only in clarifying how amino acids are formed, but also in ap1

Isaac Asimov, The Genetic Code (Toledo, Ohio: Signet, 1963). “The Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1958,” http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/chemistry/laureates/1958/; accessed March 2015.

2

270

Chapter Sixteen

plying the results in order to synthesize some of the amino acids that he had studied. In his laboratory, he succeeded in synthesizing the first artificially produced hormone – that is, he reconstructed what he had previously broken apart. This confirmed beyond any doubt that all the previous research work was faultless. From this example we can deduce some very important conclusions. First of all, the stages of the process on the theoretical plane coincided exactly with those of the natural process that was under scrutiny. Secondly, in order to achieve this, the researchers had to perform very painstaking groundwork in a logical sequence that progressed step by step from the initial stage on. And, finally, after the theory was consolidated, a practical test of the results had to be performed in order to either confirm the conclusions or repudiate them. Of course, the example above, while very convincing in itself, is not applicable to all situations. Most of our theoretical ruminations are not so easily confirmed. The heliocentric hypothesis of Copernicus, which contradicted the previously accepted geocentric view, was only accepted more than a hundred years after it was first formulated. The Periodic Table of elements was only approved about 15 years after it was first proposed by Dmitri Mendeleev. It is because of the delays and complications that are frequently involved in confirming a hypothesis that we need additional tools to help us judge new theories immediately after they are proposed. We can find these tools in semiotic reality, as I will explain in the next section. The most important function of semiotic reality: transmitting meaning We have shown that all our theoretical inferences are expressed with the help of signs. They may be drawings, diagrams, numbers, words, or signs of any other kind, but they

What Is Semiotic Reality?

271

must be signs. And signs are not just tools of minor significance that help us give structure to our private thoughts; every sign has a meaning that is common to the members of a particular community. Scientists have found it difficult to precisely define the concept of meaning. In their book, The Meaning of Meaning, Ogden and Richards gathered about 80 distinct definitions of the word meaning. “Whatever meaning is, ‘symbols’ [what I call “signs”] come to play that important part in our life, [even] becoming the source of all our power over the external world.”3 This conclusion is correct: since they have a more or less fully delineated and commonly accepted meaning, each and every sign becomes a vehicle for transporting its meaning from one mind to the other. If people agree on a specific meaning for a sign (this agreement is, in fact, what makes it a sign for them), using it in a definite context is essentially the same as transplanting internal thoughts to other people’s minds. It is, of course, true that multiple signs can denote one and the same object, and, furthermore, that alternative signs for the same object can convey slightly different meanings (or senses, as explained below). This happens because disparate signs have different degrees of abstractness, and hence their abilities to transfer meanings may be limited in certain ways. Nonetheless, it remains indisputable that signs can transfer meanings, even if there are some limits to their abilities to do so.

3

Ogden C. K., & Richards, A. The Meaning of Meaning. A Study of the Influence of Language upon Thought and of the Science of Symbolism. Magdalene College, Oxford University, 1923.

272

Chapter Sixteen

Expressing diverse “senses” using different signs As I mentioned above,4 a sign can have both a meaning and a sense. The meaning of a sign is simply the object represented by it, while its sense is its meaning in a specific context. This distinction derives from the fact that a particular sign can only highlight certain definite aspects of the object it represents. The first person who pointed out the difference between meaning and sense in understanding signs was the German mathematician Gottlob Frege. In his paper, “On Sense and Meaning,”5 he compared two designations of the planet Venus – “morning star” and “evening star.” Whereas their meanings remained the same (Venus), their senses were not completely identical. Frege called this latter aspect of a sign its mode of presentation. Semioticians from Frege’s time on have adopted this distinction. Let us look more closely at what it means. To begin, we must ask ourselves: what is actually denoted by a sign? The usual answer is that a sign denotes some object or phenomenon that exists in ontological or semiotic reality. But this answer is only partially right; a more correct one would be that a sign denotes an object or phenomenon in its concrete environment, at a specific moment, and from a particular point of view. This rather complex answer reflects the fact that every “real” object is only relatively the same in different circumstances; in actuality, it is always different. To make sure that we are speaking about the same thing every time we discuss it, we have to pretend that it does not change, even though it is actually always different. In many cases, we are nonetheless 4

See pages 22-23. Frege, G. “Über Sinn und Bedeutung” (“On Sense and Reference”). Zeitschrift für Philosophie und philosophische Kritik, Nr. 100, 1892, ss. 25-50. 5

What Is Semiotic Reality?

273

forced to represent the thing differently, either because it looks different, or because the tools we use to understand or work with it are different, or because we ourselves are different. In short, when we declare that the designated object remains immutable in all its presentations, we are essentially making a false claim, because, in fact, we are actually only designating that part of the object that we can reproduce at the moment with the instruments and abilities that are currently at our disposal. Let us say, for example, that we are studying an object from ontological reality, like the sun. We study it for a rather long period of time, from various positions and under an array of conditions. And every time we study it, we designate the object “the sun,” as if it was always one and the same object. When we do this, we are very well aware that this is not so, that our sun changes every minute, that its energy is constantly diminishing, that some of the hydrogen it contains is burning and reforming as helium, and so on. In short, many objects, like the sun, do not stay the same for a moment, but in order to indicate that we are mentally referring to the same natural object, we always use the same designation for it. It would be very burdensome if we did not do so – if every time we referred to the sun, we had to explain what exactly we have in mind – especially if it undergoes insignificant alterations that do not distort our understanding of it as it is. In fact, when a change in an object does affect our understanding of it, we pointedly mention it and elaborate on the differences. Thus, by silent agreement, we consent to refer to everchanging entities as if they were immutable, even though, in reality, they are not. Still, when we want to underline changes in a single object that took place under various circumstances, we use different signs – like “evening star” and “morning star” for Venus.

274

Chapter Sixteen

Logic and semiotic reality A number of issues arise as a result of the fact that semiotic reality originates in our minds. When we investigate ontology, we are tied to what we encounter and “see” in the external world, but when we draw conclusions about these encounters, we are completely immersed in our thoughts. As a result, our conclusions may be affected not only by external considerations, but also by our imaginations, and our imaginations can lead us astray to undesirable conclusions. This is not really a problem when we are dealing with the arts, because our imagination is the breeding ground of art, and art cannot exist without it. In strictly defined and logically formulated scientific deliberations, however, our imagination may lead us off course. From personal experience, people became aware of this pitfall; in response, they made efforts to tame the otherwise unbounded powers of their imaginations. They invented logic, which directed their thoughts along the correct paths by formulating very rigid rules to guide them. In addition, they conceived rules for correctly and clearly defining all the signs they were using in their thoughts. Let us now look at how people arrive at such rigorous and stringent definitions. People create the definitions they need by inventing “scaffolding” for their thoughts. This scaffolding is something that does not exist in ontology, but is necessary for producing accurate mental judgments. I use the term scaffolding in a figurative sense, because I want to compare this kind of mental device with the devices used in the construction of tall buildings. In building, we employ supports of various kinds to allow us to advance higher and higher in the building process. After the structure is finished, the people living in it are not aware of the scaffolds that were used during its construction, but scaffolds are indispensable for erecting structures like these. The same thing occurs with our mental scaffolding: af-

What Is Semiotic Reality?

275

ter the conceptual structure is completed, many people use the end-product without knowing about the supporting apparatus that was used during its creation. Let me give a few examples of this type of process, and then we will dwell at length on how it is set up. From time immemorial, humans have drawn conclusions by analogy, using what is generally called inductive reasoning. This is something people initially learned from nature. They saw that every day began with a morning that followed the previous night, continued into the afternoon, and ended with twilight. Similarly, they observed that summer came after spring; that after the summer ended, the days started to become shorter and winter came, and so on. People understood from these events that there were constant changes which invariably seemed to follow the same pattern, and identified the earlier event as the cause of the one following it. They then introduced this same method in order to draw conclusions about other things. In this way, people invented a logical, consequential thought device, which came to be part of our thought scaffolding. Nonetheless, to many obstinate non-believers, this manner of reaching conclusions did not appear convincing. They protested and said: “Why should we assert as an absolute truth that all swans are white and all ravens are black?” To the reply that this was because they had only ever seen white swans and black ravens, they said, “So what?! Perhaps in the lands we have not yet explored, there are black swans and white ravens.” And in some cases, the non-believers appeared to be right. But this did not prevent people from accepting the inductive method of reasoning, because without it we could not reach the majority of our everyday and apparently “obvious” conclusions. For most practical purposes, the inductive manner of thinking appeared unavoidable, and people silently agreed

276

Chapter Sixteen

that in spite of the fact that it is not absolutely foolproof, we cannot give it up. This is another example of the “as-if” behavior we employ in the realm of semiotic reality, but not in ontology. In ontology, we cannot follow make-believe truths indefinitely, because every step we take in real life can be fatal, if we base it on incorrect notions. The fact that some of our conjectures prove to be fallacious, even though our inductive inferences are correct, means that we have to be very cautious when we use this method of thinking, by avoiding conjectures and guesses whenever possible. Another type of mental scaffolding we employ in the sphere of semiotic reality is that we build various complicated mental structures of what I call provisional logical importance. The most prominent feature of these constructions is the fact that they do not exist in ontology at all; rather, they exist only as part of our mental efforts to achieve correct and unequivocal reasoning. I have already mentioned that every sign we use has its own specific definition. To arrive at an unambiguous definition in every concrete case is a difficult task; to simplify this task, people invented special mental devices. I will describe the most important of these below. Every natural language contains words of various types. I divide the words of natural languages into categories based on their degrees of abstraction. There are three such categories: 1. Proper names, which have the lowest degree of abstraction 2. Notions, which denote an entire class of referents rather than a single referent 3. Concepts, which are the most important notions, and constitute the skeleton of a branch of science or a professional sphere of activity; these words have the highest degree of abstraction. Each of these groups has its own logical scheme for the formation of definitions for the words it comprises. We con-

What Is Semiotic Reality?

277

vey the meaning of a proper name by describing its referent. For example: “Bismarck was the man who united Germany,” or “Big Bertha was the name of the cannon that bombed Paris from afar during the First World War.” In such definitions, we mention as many features of the sign-referent as are needed to clarify it to the expected audience. Notions are the words that are typically defined in general dictionaries. When we define a notion, we usually employ the scheme called Porphyry’s Tree. Porphyry, who is thought to have lived in the second century AD, wrote a book called Isagoge (“Introduction,” in Greek) about Aristotle’s categories. In it, Porphyry put forth a logical scheme built as a genus– species “ladder.” To get the definition of a term in this type of scheme, you “descend” the levels of the ladder, from the general to the specific, until you reach the level of detail needed to define the term. Thus, to define the notion of “man,” Porphyry began from the most general notion, “substance,” and descended from there to certain genus and species levels. At each level, the scope of the notion shrinks, until he arrives at the level containing the definition of “man” as “rational human body.” This definition consists of the species characteristic, “rational,” preceded by the genus immediately above it, “human body.” This combination of genus and species has become the most accepted method for constructing definitions of notions. Open a general dictionary in any modern language, and you will see that most of the words in it are defined in this way. Thus, in the Collins English Learner’s Dictionary (1974), the word “whale” is defined as a “type of very large sea animal,” where “sea animal” is the genus and “very large” is its species. This logical scheme is widely used today even for relatively complicated notions, including a large number of classes and subclasses, like flower, house, or school. (In the context of our discussion, it is interesting to note that Porphyry

278

Chapter Sixteen

remarked in another place in the book, “Do they – the species and genera – really exist or are they only our mental entities?” The third category of words, concepts, contains what are, in my view, the most important notions of each of the particular spheres of human activity, such as sciences and professional occupations. They are of such an abstract nature that some of them do not even have genera above them, so Porphyry’s tree cannot be used to define them. In any case, these are the words that are the fulcrums of their respective fields; because of this, they require a much more reliable mechanism than Porphyry’s Tree for constructing their definitions. It is these concepts that are introduced by the lecturer at the beginning of a course, and are expanded upon and characterized in greater detail throughout the term. In lexicons of the fields to which they belong, these concepts are usually used as the headings of whole sections. To define concepts like these, I have proposed a modified version of Porphyry’s Tree that I call a conceptual grid. Here, for example, is the conceptual grid for jurisprudence:

What Is Semiotic Reality?

279

Figure 16-2

A grid of this type can be built for any science or for any of its relatively autonomous parts. Thus, within the realm of jurisprudence, we can construct individual grids for civil law, administrative law, family law, etc. We can also erect conceptual grids for any professional pursuit that has its own special terminology, like, for instance, a hobby involving a collection of items (philately, coin collections, and the like). Every grid contains hierarchically positioned levels, each of which contains a number of similar entities. As in Porphyry’s Tree, horizontal levels serve as genera for the species evolved from them, which are shown on the next level down. But, in con-

280

Chapter Sixteen

trast with Porphyry’s Tree, in the conceptual grid, each level must show not only two opposing notions, but all of the notions that compose the genus above them. The complete grid will thus include all the major concepts of the subject-matter it analyzes, with each concept in its appropriate place in the whole. Each cell is defined both by its place in the vertical hierarchy and in comparison with all the other phenomena on its horizontal level. In this way, we build a solid and well-balanced framework. Not only can this grid define every component inside it, it can also serve many other functions. For instance, it can serve as a source for keywords in searching for publications. These, then, are what I deem to be the most important methods of logic. There is no doubt in my mind that the methods of logic I described above belong exclusively to the semiotic plane and do not exist in ontological reality at all. Their presence in ontology is latent; the human mind is needed to expose and explain them. There are other methods of logic that are used for similar purposes. All of these methods were invented by humans in order to make us the most rational and sound-minded creatures in the world.

Dissemination of knowledge through semiotic reality Another very important function of semiotic reality is the dissemination of knowledge. Once a new piece of information has been incorporated into the semiotic plane of our lives, it becomes available to all of humanity at large. Simply speaking, by being included in semiotic reality, the information immediately becomes collective property. I do not mean this in the judicial sense: there are many laws that protect the rights of authors of new ideas, including compensation due from those who make use of them. What I mean is that, from

What Is Semiotic Reality?

281

the moment we learn about a new idea, it becomes our possession and cannot be blocked from our minds again. New ideas act as if they are naturally endowed to us, as if they belong to us personally from the moment we learn of them. We can look at them from different angles, change them, expand on them, and so on. In short, we assimilate them into ourselves. Whenever new ideas come into existence, they are incorporated into the general storehouse of semiotic entities called semiotic reality (no. 2 in the diagram), and also into certain particular parts of it (nos. 3-7 in the diagram above – practical occupations, science, arts, mythology, religion, or education). As the diagram shows, these two repositories of semiotic data, the general one that holds all ideas, and the compartments it contains, exist in parallel. When a new and fruitful idea enters the general semiotic collection, it is usually applied to analogous situations that have somewhat different conditions. As soon as someone presents an invention or a new theory, and proves its validity, it is borrowed by others for use in diverse ways that were not directly stated at the outset. Thus, very soon (relatively speaking, of course) after the first alphabetic writing appeared in the Near East, it was applied to a number of other national languages. First it was borrowed by Greeks, then by Romans, and then it started to be used in Slavic languages.6 Each time it was used, it was embellished slightly differently, but the fact that the new systems were adapted from the original system remains indisputable. The same thing happened with the decimal system of numeration. It was brought by Arab merchants from India to the European countries, where, over the course of a few centuries, it ousted the systems that were previously used; and it has reigned in Europe ever since. 6

See also pages 57 and 218.

282

Chapter Sixteen

On a smaller scale, the same thing occurs in the special compartments – which I call sectors – of semiotic reality mentioned above. The difference is that each of these sectors only collects signs and sign-systems that are relevant to it. This makes it easier to find the signs and sign-systems there, where they are divided up by different sciences and linked to the specific approaches of those sciences, especially if the person seeking them is familiar with the field to which they belong. Relationships between different sectors of semiotic reality The sectors of semiotic reality can relate to one another in a variety of ways. I have identified three of these: complementing, opposition, and rejection. Sectors of semiotic reality complement one another when they share the same signs or sign-systems. For example, the sciences and those aspects of education that are related to them can be expected to share the same sign-systems: chemistry in its scientific form should coincide with chemistry as it is taught in schools. In reality, the complementary relationship between science and science education is limited. We encounter the same sign-systems in these two human endeavors, but their representations in the sphere of education have their own peculiarities, and the disparities are sometimes very substantial. Why? Because the logic of application interferes: we present the same truth differently to different audiences. It is impossible to teach the same material to different people in the same manner. Even in institutions of higher education, the presentation of topics frequently deviates from a pure scientific approach to the issues that are under investigation. This is all the more true when science is studied in lowerlevel schools, like primary or secondary schools. Every time teachers begin to teach a subject, they must take the measure of their students anew. This is the first rule of teaching meth-

What Is Semiotic Reality?

283

odology that is taught to teachers-in-training. It is also why the subject-matter of every branch of science is interpreted and presented differently in the two related sectors of semiotic reality, science and education. These two sectors cooperate but are also discordant in their approaches to the same topics. Other sectors of semiotic reality interact with one another in a relation of opposition, or even rejection. This type of interaction is demonstrated, for example, by the relationship between science and religion. I know that I am approaching very slippery ground by mentioning this example; this particular conflict has been debated from time immemorial and has not found a solution yet. Nonetheless, I will introduce my personal point of view on this topic. To my mind, religion must not interfere with scientific research – the two have different aims and different means for achieving them. If science comes to conclusions that contradict religious sources (this happens constantly), the religious attitude to the issue in question should be changed, no matter how hard this may seem to be, in favor of the scientific truths. The most pronounced case of this kind arose at the beginning of the seventeenth century, when the famous Italian physicist, Galileo Galilei, endorsed the geocentric model of our solar system that was advanced by Copernicus. Galileo, who was, by the way, a deeply religious person, was forced to reject his inner convictions. Yet he wrote that God created two sources of truth – nature and scripture. Scripture, he said, shows the road to chaste life (that is, it shows how to live morally), while nature behaves as it was designed to by God. Thus, according to Galileo, the Bible deals with a different aspect of existence from science and ought not to interfere with scientific work. Since Galileo’s time, science has made a great deal of tremendously important discoveries, and has completely changed our mode of life for the better. Every time human discoveries contradicted sacred doctrines, the doctrines were

284

Chapter Sixteen

forced to retreat. Even so, many people retained their religious beliefs while they reaped the fruits of the scientific revelations those beliefs denied. Nevertheless, over time, the traditions that have been shown to be fallacious have had to bend before the advances of science. I am sure that there are many other types of relationships between the various semiotic sectors, but I simply do not know what they are yet. What I wrote in this chapter was intended as a kind of suggestion for further research in this very essential sphere.

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN SOME FUNCTIONS OF SEMIOTIC REALITY

I have already written a bit about the functions of semiotic reality in chapter 4.1 In the current chapter, I want to deal with this topic in a more systematic way. To be sure, I will not be able to analyze all of the functions of semiotic reality, because it is an enormous subject. Instead, I will focus on those functions that seem to me to be the most important and to contribute the most to a better understanding of semiotic reality. I have therefore chosen to discuss five functions of semiotic reality: 1. Uncovering, disseminating, and applying new knowledge 2. Improving, extending, and simplifying existing signs and sign-systems 3. Supporting the advancement of scientific research 4. Translating and reworking sign-systems for new environments 5. Supporting existing traditions

Revealing new knowledge Modern epistemology (theory of knowledge) does not pay much attention to the role signs play in the process of extracting new knowledge. Rather, epistemology concentrates on two central concepts: the subject (the investigator) and the 1

See pages 56-58.

286

Chapter Seventeen

object of investigation. The situation was different in ancient Greece, where some philosophers argued for a tripartite model based on the interaction of the subject and the object with signs, the latter of which constituted an integral part of the whole process. Indeed, the integration of signs in scientific research enables researchers to explain their findings in greater detail and with more lucidity, as I will very briefly explain in this section. The process of scientific research of any kind can be divided into four consecutive stages: 1. Observing the object of investigation 2. Understanding what you observed 3. Explaining what you observed to others 4. Finding and implementing valuable practical applications for your discoveries In each of these phases, signs play a very important, if not decisive, role, as I will now explain. Observing The first stage of research entails choosing what to investigate and which investigative methods to employ. At this stage, you gather together all of the existing knowledge about the object of interest; that is, you access the existing semiotic reality of the object of investigation. Next, you select the tools to use for observing the object. If no appropriate tools exist, you must create them: microscopes for observing the microscopic world, telescopes for observing the macroscopic world, etc. Nonetheless, many things remain unobservable, either because they are too distant, too small, or too abstract. When the object of investigation is not observable, you must create a mental model of it, like Einstein did for his theories of relativity. The model you develop will, of course, be built using signs.

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

287

Signs in models of this kind are only interim signs; their validity cannot be conclusively established until some form of empirical verification is acquired. When Copernicus’s system was introduced, it could not immediately compete with Ptolemy’s conception, which was already widely accepted, and had a significant amount of empirical verification. In particular, tables built on Ptolemy’s theory predicted the movements of cosmic bodies much more reliably than those based on Copernicus’s new theory. Thus, Copernicus’s theory had to wait for empirical verification of some sort, before it could be accepted as correct. Once verification was secured, the new model could oust the old one, and, in fact, this is what occurred. In the interim periods between the presentation of new theories and their empirical verification, proponents of new theories must rely exclusively on the force of their arguments. This means that during that time, the theory is in a sort of limbo, essentially just waiting on the sidelines until someone finds a way of proving its validity. Nonetheless, this does not mean that, after you propose a theory, you should just sit and do nothing; rather, you should try to explain what would be required to verify your ideas, and try to arrange for this to take place. But, until the verification is received, the ideas remain exclusively within the sphere of semiotic reality. Understanding When you see (or think you see) something new, the first things you must do are comprehend it and interpret it. Initially, you do this on your own and just for yourself. Already in the process of observation, you have to use signs to designate the new things that you have identified. If the signs you need already exist, you apply them; if the thing you observed is quite novel, you invent new signs as necessary. The signs you create do not only serve to name the new things; you endow

288

Chapter Seventeen

them with distinct qualities and characteristics. If the new phenomenon is too abstract to deal with directly, you develop methods for relating to it by means of merged signs, like formulas. Explaining The processes of observing and understanding described above cause new signs to appear in the world, but these signs are only established after their acceptance by the scientific community. In order to receive the approval of this community, you have to explain your innovations. To this end, you have to refer to signs that are already known; in general, you will employ linguistic entities – words that are understandable to most people – for this purpose. But you may well make use of many other kinds of signs – words, diagrams, drawings, etc. – to convince your colleagues and other audiences that what you suggest is worth discussing seriously. Once you succeed in this, it is time to prepare some convincing empirical forms of confirmation for your hypothesis. It is only after both the acceptance and the empirical confirmation are secured that your invention advances beyond the status of hypothesis to being an actual theory. Applying Having passed through all of the previous stages, you begin to look for valuable practical applications for your theory. Perhaps you design a new machine or instrument, an application that becomes part of ontological reality. Or, perhaps you use your theory to expand some aspect of theoretical knowledge – to contribute to the body of semiotic reality. Either way, it becomes an integral part of our existential environment.

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

289

Honing signs and sign-systems Those signs and sign-systems that have won places in the conglomeration of human semiotic achievements are subject to constant and permanent scrutiny by people seeking ways to improve their effectiveness. This is true both of sign-systems and of individual signs. I have already described the difficulties people encountered when they tried to establish the meter as the basic unit of distance measurement.2 Even after the meter became the most widely used unit of length in the world, people continued to work towards making it yet more functional. The attempts to perfect it proceeded along two pathways: a search for ways to improve the prototype of the meter, and an attempt to more accurately and objectively define the distance represented by a meter. The first prototype of the meter was manufactured in metal and kept under guard in a specially controlled environment. Countries that chose to introduce the metric system acquired duplicates of the prototype from France. They used these prototypes to produce rulers with metric calibration, which were then employed in practical applications. Today, a newer, more accurate prototype is in use, and the length of a meter is defined much more exactly. Since 1983, the meter has been defined as “the length of the path travelled by light in a vacuum during a time interval of 1/299,792,458 of a second.” Although conceptualizing this value is beyond our mind’s abilities, the definition reflects the continuing progress of scientific achievements in metrology. I do not know whether the current definition and prototype will ultimately prove to be final. Perhaps not; perhaps in the future people will need a measuring rod that is yet more exact. Either way, this example shows how signs are constantly examined by people seeking ways to improve their efficacy. 2

See page 264.

290

Chapter Seventeen

Mendeleev’s periodic table of elements was introduced in 1869, and it reflected the state of affairs in chemistry at that time. Its publication constituted a major breakthrough in the field of chemistry, and sparked further advances in chemical research. Since then, the number of known chemical elements has increased nearly twofold; today, the accepted form of the table is clearly overcrowded, and it no longer stimulates research. It remains valuable only because of its visual power, which makes it useful for introducing chemical elements to schoolchildren. Since the invention of the periodic table, more than one hundred new designs of similar tables have been proposed. Apparently, chemists did not find any of them more effective than the existing version, because they still use the old pattern of the table. Even so, one must acknowledge that the table has undergone many significant changes over the years, and has incorporated most of the innovations in chemistry that came to fruition in the years since the table was first introduced. Nevertheless, today the table looks as primitive as Ptolemy’s model of the solar system did immediately before its repudiation by Copernicus. At this point, it is important to clearly state that most of the innovations in semiotic systems move in one direction – from signs of lesser abstraction to signs of greater abstraction. Let us look more closely at another example, one that we touched upon previously:3 the development of monetary systems. (Perhaps it would be better to say systems of universal value, because the same developmental process can be seen in other, similar systems.) In the earliest days of human trade, people used barter to acquire things they could not produce themselves. They simply exchanged something they had for something they did not have. This may be defined as the natural system of trade, because people using it tried ad hoc to establish equivalence between the things they exchanged. When 3

See page 145.

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

291

barter is the exclusive form of trade in a particular society, that society can be said to be in the natural stage of tradesystem development. It is worthwhile to note that this type of system was even in use among people in some undeveloped societies in the 20th century; thus, even in the 20th century, some societies were in the natural stage of trade-system development. The barter system has significant drawbacks, insomuch as it is cumbersome and very inexact in matching the values of the items exchanged in each transaction. In view of these shortcomings, people invented another system of trading: they chose a very popular product in their region and used it as the universal medium of exchange for buying and selling goods. In some regions, salt was used for this purpose, and portions of salt were given as payment for all other traded goods. In other regions, people chose other items as their medium of exchange. For example, in wooded areas, animal furs were a common choice. The innovation of the universal medium of exchange represented real progress in trade systems; the age in which it first came to be practiced in a particular society can be seen as the beginning of the iconic stage in that society’s trade-system development. Although the use of a particular good as a universal medium of exchange constituted a major improvement in the trade system, it was still very cumbersome. Because of this, people invented a new type of medium of exchange: money. At first, they produced coins of gold or silver whose values as commodities were the values engraved on them. Later, they progressed to money that was made of cheaper materials, like copper, iron, or paper, whose value as currency was imprinted on them, but was not related to the values of the materials from which they were made. Learning to accept such “worthless” money was not easy for many people; in fact, mutiny and insurrection were common responses to its introduction.

292

Chapter Seventeen

In the long run, the resistance to the use of currency lacking any inherent value was overcome, both because it was much easier to pay for goods with that sort of money, and because the value of the money was guaranteed by states or other reliable institutions, such as banks. The process described above – the gradual introduction and acceptance of new forms of currency – clearly involves a steady advance to more and more abstract signs, from the use of natural products as barter in ancient times, to the modern era’s acceptance of worthless pieces of paper whose value is guaranteed by administrative means. Nor has the process come to an end yet; right now, we are beginning to see the disappearance of money. Today, we pay for more and more things with credit cards, and, furthermore, there is no longer any need to meet the seller of the goods you are buying; you can call him on the phone, or send him an order over the internet, and give him your credit card number as payment. The seller makes sure your credit card company will cover the charge, and then sends you the goods. It is easy to predict that money will be extinct very soon. The metamorphoses of payment methods clearly illustrate how people introduce ever more sophisticated signs into existing systems in order to improve the way they work. As a result of this process, the entropy of the system is constantly diminished. This is very important, because it is indicative of a significant distinction between systems in ontological reality and systems in semiotic reality. In ontological reality, scientists usually differentiate open systems from closed systems. Ludwig von Bertalanfy, in his well-known book, General System Theory, stated that “the change of entropy in closed systems is always positive; order is continually destroyed. In open systems, however, we have not only production of entropy due to irreversible processes, but also import of entropy

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

293

which may well be negative.”4 I can add to this that in semiotic reality, which is completely the product of the human mind and remains permanently under our control, entropy is always diminished over time. We humans affect semiotic systems exclusively in one direction: in the direction of more and more order in the system. This is true for all semiotic systems, be they small or large, simple or complicated. It is clearly evident in the example of the history of money, and it is also what happens with human languages. That languages always change is undoubtedly true; you need only compare literature from our time with that of a century ago, and you will immediately see the difference in the language. And if you read texts from two or three centuries ago, you will probably not even understand some passages. The question is, in what direction do these changes go? I assert that they reduce the entropy of linguistic systems; i.e., languages enter a state of less disorder when they become more and more self-sustainable. Unorganized languages demand more help from extra-linguistic sources, like gestures, mimicry, and restating with alternative words; well-organized languages can rely exclusively on purely linguistic instruments from within the systems themselves. The same is true of every sign-system: they all rely on the positive effects of people simplifying their existing patterns. At this juncture, I would like to clarify why I hold that the entropy of sign-systems is reduced as they become more abstract. A number of people have asked me a seemingly simple and undemanding question about this: “How can you declare that the entropy of today’s systems, which are becoming more and more abstract and sophisticated, is decreasing? If you say that the meaning of a meter today is “the length of the path 4

See Ludwig von Bertalanfy, General System Theory (New York: George Braziller, revised edition, 1976), page 41.

294

Chapter Seventeen

travelled by light in a vacuum during a time interval of 1/299,792,458 of a second,” does this reflect a decrease of the entropy of the sign, or an increase? Before this definition was set, we could easily understand what a meter was by simply looking at a ruler; now, with this new definition, we cannot even imagine what it is. Nonetheless, I still assert that this new definition actually represents a decrease in the entropy of our understanding of the sign and our ability to make use of it for practical applications. The new definition is more exact, and that means that it is more correctly formulated. Our visual imagination may fail us when we are faced with this definition, but that does not mean that the sign has more entropy in the framework of its applications. On the contrary, it becomes more stable and selfsustainable. Another factor is involved with this: in view of the fact that the human mind does not understand the excessive abstraction of some signs, we must transfer their management to other mechanisms. This point seems to be missing from all of our discussions on the abstraction of signs and their systems, but, it is the culmination of the issue. Since our minds are unable to grasp the meanings of some signs, we cannot manage some sign-systems properly by ourselves, and must therefore pass these tasks on to machines. And that is, in fact, what really happens. As long as the density of traffic on the roads was not very great, we could easily drive our cars manually. Little by little, the volume of traffic has grown; as a result, driving ourselves has become more and more difficult, which has led to an increase in the number and severity of road accidents. In the future, we can only expect traffic density to increase further. The outcome from this situation, in my view, will be that we will be forced to switch to automated vehicles that are programmed to drive us around.

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

295

The introduction of this technological innovation is clearly within view already. Automatic piloting of aircraft is already in full swing, and the same is true of cosmic flights. We need not be afraid of the automation process, because we humans will continue to create the programs for our machines and to improve them all the time, reducing their entropy in the process. Automatic flight control in bomber aircraft was already introduced at the end of the Second World War. It controlled the process of plunging for bombing, stopping the plunge before the plane was dangerously close to land, and ascending back to the sky. The introduction of automation resulted in a decisive drop in casualties among pilots, which had been at catastrophic levels beforehand: human beings simply could not respond with the same speed and precision as the automated mechanisms could. Did this mean human control of the process was reduced? Not at all; pilots were simply free to perform other important tasks while the bombing mission was underway. Besides, the final decision about who (or what) will dictate the actions of the system will always remain under human control. Thus, we will retain our position of “kings of the universe,” and rebellious machines will never rise up and threaten their human masters.

Advancing scientific research In scientific investigations, the role of semiotic reality is specific and clear-cut. It is semiotic reality that enables researchers to acquire a preliminary acquaintance with what was already done in their fields of investigation, and it is semiotic reality that allows them to create new signs in these systems as they proceed with new research. I have already written about this earlier, so I will simply sum it up here. Before I begin, I must remind you once more that in interactions between semiotic and ontological reality, a third factor – that of the human mind – must not be forgotten.

296

Chapter Seventeen

The ways in which semiotic reality fosters researchers’ acquaintance with previous research is clear and does not require any further discussion. Let us concentrate now on the role of semiotic reality in the preparation of signs for future use. Every sign in a sign-system is given both a name and a definition. The name consists of a special term (i.e., a word) and, if the system is high in abstraction, a special symbol. The symbol is used in transformations, which can be performed with signs of very high abstraction. When no transformation is in progress, we can relate to the sign using the less abstract part of its name – the term used to designate it; linguistic designations are more suitable for explanations. For example, every chemical element has a name and a symbol. The symbols are used for transformations, while the names are employed for explanations. The same is true of the central concepts and forces dealt with in physics. In less abstract systems, double-designation, with both a term and a symbol, is not necessary. The various practical occupations of everyday life do not demand symbols, though they abound in special terms for the signs in their systems, for the tools they use, and for the operations they perform. For example, the practical occupation of tailoring uses names for the different articles being produced, for the materials they are made of, for the tools of the profession, and for the various operations performed by the workers, but none of these things are coded with symbols. Systems can be accurately rated as more or less abstract based entirely on this criterion. Chemistry, physics, math, and logic are very abstract systems and have an extensive number of symbols for representing most of their terms. In chemistry and physics, the symbols have fixed referents, in the sense that the symbols always represent the same items. In algebra and mathematical logic, the symbols are used ad hoc, representing different referents each time they are used. This fea-

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

297

ture leads us to conclude that math and logic are more abstract than chemistry and physics. Furnishing these qualities to signs and sign-systems is a function of semiotic reality and takes place when the sign-system is initially constructed. Semiotic reality is also the field in which signs and signsystems are prepared for future use. Sign-systems are most useful when they have algorithms that define how their signs can be transformed for various applications. Without such predefined algorithms, potential users of the systems won’t know what to do with the signs. Systemic algorithms include: 1. Enumeration of all (or nearly all) basic signs in the system 2. Syntactic rules detailing how simple signs can be merged into compound signs 3. Rules for putting compounds together to create texts of different lengths – sentences, paragraphs, and entire documents These algorithms compose what we call the metalanguage of a sign-system. Languages all have their own specific metalanguages. They have dictionaries, which list words and give succinct definitions of them; grammars, which give the rules for assigning properties to the signs (morphology) and transforming them (syntax); and additional metalanguages, which explain linguistic sub-systems – phonetics, writing, etc. In complicated systems, there may be a number of metalanguages, although one will always be the main one, and the others will be auxiliary to it. Knowledge of the metalanguages of very important systems is often required of people in certain groups. Some metalanguages, like the metalanguages of the national language and of basic mathematics, are taught in schools. Others are mandatory for those who become active in a particular kind of activity – driving cars, flying planes, engaging in a specific dangerous sport, etc. Familiarity with the metalanguages of

298

Chapter Seventeen

some sign-systems is not compulsory, but people have to learn them in order to effectively work with the systems to which they relate (music, or games like chess, for example). In these cases, finding a way to concisely explain the metalanguage to people who may not be acquainted with the system is often difficult. For example, it is often problematic to explain the use of mobile telephones or computers to people who, because of their age, are not experienced with them. Here are some brief recommendations for those who compose such instructions: 1. Keep the instructions as concise as possible. 2. Make sure the order of the items in the instructions is logical, and that each subsequent item naturally follows the previous one. 3. Only explain main terms in detail. 4. If explanations in words are necessary, illustrate them with pictures or diagrams. This is especially important when explanations of algorithms for dealing with systems are addressed to relatively uneducated users. 5. Give further references to those interested in learning more about the metalanguage being presented.

Transplanting semiotic systems into new environments One of the most important functions of semiotic reality is to transplant sign-systems to new environments. If a new system is created in one part of the earth, and it is more practical and efficient than existing systems with similar purposes, it can and should be transported to other countries and regions. This is not as simple as it may seem, and it deserves detailed consideration. The well-known adage, “science is international,” is only partially correct. Indeed, some parts of sign-

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

299

systems – those that are built upon the most abstract signs – may be transplanted as they are. Sciences that only employ these types of sign-systems can be brought to other places on earth as-is. But even with regard to these sciences, only the upper layer of signs can be transplanted in this way. The other levels, and all levels of less-abstract sign-systems, must be accommodated to new environments, and many hurdles must be overcome in the process. The language barrier The main difficulty in transplanting a sign-system to new places is that people in the destination locales do not understand the language used by the inventors of the sign-system. Many good theories and inventions have been lost because of this problem. People began to dream of ways to overcome the language barrier long ago. One popular idea was to invent an artificial language that all of mankind could be taught, a language that would replace all the disparate natural languages currently in use. Two episodes stand out in the history of attempts to create and disseminate an artificial language of this type. The first was very prominent during the Enlightenment (17th-18th centuries), and the second dates to the end of the 19th century. During the first episode, such great figures as Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz and Rene Descartes showed deep interest in the idea. Both were brilliant mathematicians, and believed that since mathematical signs are understood by everybody in the same way, there would be no obstacle to inventing a language whose signs would be universally understood. In their view, the required signs would only have to express ideas, because they saw ideas as the incarnation of human thoughts. A number of highly acclaimed experiments in the building of such languages, which were called philosophical languages, were undertaken in the 17th-18th centuries. Two 17th-

300

Chapter Seventeen

century projects progressed quite far, one undertaken by the Scottish thinker George Dalgarno, and the other by the English bishop John Wilkins. Both tried to identify the main notions that are characteristic of human thoughts, and present them graphically; and both failed. The idea of creating a universal language was revived in the second half of the 19th century, at which time the main motivations were the notions of pan-human brotherhood and the unity of all the peoples of the world. New artificial languages were publicized by scores of authors, and each one was built on a slightly different linguistic foundation than those that were created before it (which shows that people do sometimes learn lessons from previous failures). In all of these projects, an existing and well-known national language was taken as a model, and the basic signs of the new language were identified as words (words in all their incarnations), rather than notions. All the properties of the natural languages on which these languages were built were kept intact, and the developers of the universal languages simply selected what they considered to be the best parts of those languages to include in their systems. Only one of all of these artificial languages has survived to this day. This language, Esperanto, was invented in 1878 by Lazar Zamenhof, a 19-year-old high-school graduate from Lithuania. Zamenhof was distressed by the enmity people of different nationalities felt for one another, and wanted to create a common language that would convert the enmity into love. As the basis for his language, he chose well-known international words as root-words, and then created suffixes and prefixes to form their derivatives based on some very simple grammatical rules. His project was only partially successful. He produced a very compact and clearly constructed language that, over time, evolved in such a way that it could be used for general communication, as well as for writing original and

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

301

rather complex texts and translating sample texts from other languages. Some time ago, Esperantists all over the world celebrated the centenary of Esperanto. They still hope that in the long run people will become reasonable and accept Esperanto as a common language for everyone. In my view, the dream of the Esperantists will never come true. The reason for this is basically social. Esperanto clearly represents a simplified everyday language, but it is crippled by the fact that its users have neglected to build professional terminology in it. People who like Esperanto use it at home and speak it with their fellow Esperantists, but when they go to their workplaces, they switch back to the language of their locale. Because of this, over the hundred years of its existence, Esperanto has remained underdeveloped on its professional level. Every natural language in use today is much more mature than Esperanto from this standpoint, and this is especially true of English. Representing the most technically and socially developed community in the world, English also possesses the richest terminological dictionaries for every walk of life. It is for this reason that English became the most accepted international language over the last 100 years; people in non-English-speaking countries have made the effort to learn English because they use it for the advancement of their professional interests and projects. In this respect, Esperanto, even though it is much easier to master than English, lost the contest and essentially remained a hobby pursued only by its admirers. The failure of Esperanto to become established as an international language does not mean that people have given up their desire to overcome the language barrier in communication and in the dissemination of knowledge. Rather, they have chosen a different road for achieving this goal: using one of the existing natural languages, English, for international interactions.

302

Chapter Seventeen

Despite the importance of language sign-systems, I would like to stress that I strongly reject attempts to present language sign-systems as the most important systems in the gamut of existing semiotic systems. Nor do I accept the claims of many rather vocal mathematicians that their systems are the most significant. To be sure, both languages and mathematics have blossomed in their specific métiers – languages in their role as enablers of explanation for everything, and mathematical systems in their deep penetration of the profundity of existential matters. But, as members of the human race, we should revel in the whole spectrum of sign-systems that we have created and that we rely upon in so many areas of our existence. Thus, and only thus, will we guarantee the normal and well-rounded development of our race. The evolution of alphabetic notation One example of the dissemination of new systems through semiotic reality is the invention of alphabetic writing and its adoption in various countries around the world. Each time the alphabetic system was applied in a new environment, it was reworked, to a greater or lesser extent, to accommodate it to the needs of the users in that locale. In this section, I will look at the path travelled by the alphabetic system, and the problems that arose at each juncture. As is well known, alphabetic writing was invented in the region which is now called the Middle East. Some specialists consider it to be a Phoenician invention; others attribute it to the ancient Hebrews. Which nation should actually get credit for it is of no significance for our discussion, although the modern Hebrew alphabet is the only direct beneficiary of this inheritance, because it uses the same alphabet to this day. Historically, though, the whole world was the beneficiary of this achievement, because all of the other alphabets profited from it in one way or another. In the 8th century BC, the alphabet

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

303

was borrowed by the ancient Greeks. Cyrillic was developed from the Greek alphabet, but it is not the same as the Greek alphabet. Later, it was also borrowed from the Greeks by the Romans (Latin script), and then, over the centuries, by nation after nation, to this very day. Each time the alphabet was borrowed, it underwent significant modifications in its new system of signs, but the principle remained unchanged. And the principle was what mattered. Unlike the older systems of writing, whose signs referred to entire words or phrases, in alphabets the basic signs were either syllables or separate sounds. For this reason, this system of writing was called phonetic. The principle of the alphabet seems very simple: each sound of the spoken language should be represented by one, and only one, special letter. Yet not a single alphabet has achieved this coveted ideal, even though they may contain as many as a few dozen letters (signs). The reasons for this are manifold, but we can infer the principal cause of the problem. When the first alphabet was created, the inventors had no idea what sounds were used in their language, nor were they aware of the phonetic nature of the letters; these notions became clear only in our scientific era. The originators just acted on their brilliant conjecture about the new way of writing. The first Phoenician alphabet only included letters for consonant sounds. Evidently, vowels were not considered worthy of being shown in writing; people correctly surmised that the consonant frame of a word gave enough information for the reader to be able to guess what the entire denoted unit was. In unclear cases, a diacritic was added to a letter to clarify what word was intended. The notion that consonants would suffice was correct, but only for those who knew the oral dialect of the language well, and only for very primitive texts. When people encountered more sophisticated language situations, the system could not depict them in full with enough complexity. Because of this, it

304

Chapter Seventeen

was necessary to improve the system constantly by inventing new details. Modern Hebrew writing incorporates a complete basket of such provisions. When the ancient Greeks borrowed the first alphabet as a model for their own system of writing, they copied it in full, but they changed some of the letters – letters that represented sounds that were already accounted for by other letters – into either vowels or other consonants. From then on, the principle of the two kinds of sounds, consonants and vowels, was firmly established in all later alphabets. You may ask why people who know they are using a deficient system cannot change it radically to bring it in line with newer and more progressive methodology. For example, why did not people who used hieroglyphics exchange them for a new system based on the new and obviously superior principles of phonetic alphabets? The answer is that this sort of change is impossible for social reasons: sign-systems do not only have rational foundations, they also rely on social approval. I touched on this early in this book, in my initial discussion of signs, in the diagram devoted to the social components of signs.5 To change a socially approved system means to touch something rooted in the minds of millions; it is always difficult, if not completely impossible, to do. This relates directly to our current topic. The Chinese have made great efforts to improve their system of script, but they can do so only within the framework of hieroglyphics. To progress from hieroglyphics to an alphabetic construction would mean to say goodbye to much of their cultural heritage; not a single nation with a rich and long cultural history would be willing to do this. The same is true of English spelling. It is rightly considered to be complicated and illogical; George Bernard Shaw even bequeathed a large cash prize to anyone who would succeed in improving it in the manner he specified. There is no 5

See figure 6-5, page 85.

Some Functions of Semiotic Reality

305

lack of proposals for how to improve English spelling, and some of them are grounded on very sound bases. But the soundness of their foundation will not gain any of them acceptance. The reason is simple: the cardinal change in spelling will make previous cultural texts nearly worthless. And most English speakers justly reject such proposals. Another example concerns the Hebrew alphabet. As I mentioned above, this old alphabet is rather irrational, by today’s standards. Some very prominent figures in modern Jewish history, including Ze’ev (Vladimir) Jabotinsky, spoke in favor of replacing it with Latin script. But nobody has seriously considered introducing this reform, because it would force us to sacrifice our ancient and highly cherished heritage.

Supporting traditional behavior Semiotic reality is also connected with what is known as tradition. Traditions enrich our lives and organize them socially. They determine when our holidays will be celebrated and they give order to our calendar of days, weeks, and months. They define the ways we structure celebrations, what we eat and drink, and how we dress, and they impact on many other aspects of our lives. Traditions are remnants from the past, when they were the absolutely decisive factor in the formation of social life in a separate community, when there were no other options of stabilizing communal life. Nowadays, traditions change relatively quickly because of the influence of television and other communication media. But a few centuries ago, they were nearly immutable. Traditions also include signs and sign-systems. Specific signs and symbols are introduced to us as we grow up, by our families and schools, and through social interaction. It is only rare and very strong individuals who can resist these kinds of pressures, ignoring traditions and behaving as they please. The influence of churches and other social institutions com-

306

Chapter Seventeen

pletely depends on their members following their established traditions and ceremonies; it is this that enables faiths to exercise domination over their devotees. Adherents of a particular faith who are told that an established social habit practiced by its followers was decreed by God, do not even try to change that tradition. Even though the situation today is vastly different from earlier times, traditions continue to play a leading role in our social life. In principle, it is very good that something, like tradition, helps make our lives stable and predictable. That said, while traditions may be beneficial, they may also be futile, or even detrimental. It is important to differentiate between positive and negative traditions. At the very least, one should realize that any tradition expressed in signs is the result of human efforts and, as such, can be altered by humans. Tradition is neither the creation of saints nor of the Almighty Himself, but a human institution that can evolve into a different human institution. In other words, tradition belongs to the semiotic reality of our existence and, as such, it can be changed.

PART V. SUPPLEMENTS This part of the work contains four supplements to the main flow of the book: 1. The first supplement summarizes feedback I have received on earlier publications about my theory of general semiotics. 2. The second supplement chronicles my own efforts to accommodate my semiotic views to some specific branch semiotics that have long traditions of their own – traditions they developed without any external influences. Because of the fact that these semiotic systems developed in isolation, I believe that input from me and from my general theory may bring about some positive results. 3. The third supplement presents a glossary of semiotic terms I have created and collected during my research. This vocabulary is the special terminology of my theory of general semiotics. At present, it includes about 140 terms, and it is constantly being expanded and updated. I even added new terms to it while I was writing this book. In actuality, it includes far more than 140 terms, as many terms are composite (like the term logic of processing sign-systems, which enumerates four types of logic). 4. The fourth supplement contains a bibliography of my previous works in English on semiotics. These works were all published before the current book was composed, and they sometimes present more detailed explanations of the ideas that are presented here.

SUPPLEMENT I FEEDBACK ON MY SEMIOTIC THEORY

My theory of general semiotics is built upon data that was gathered as part of research on the semiotics of particular sciences and practical occupations (which I call “branch semiotics”). In addition to its theoretical value, it is also intended to ultimately have a positive influence upon these very same branch semiotics – to help the various branches of semiotics create more effective and useful semiotic systems. Therefore, it is natural that after publishing my research in manuscripts and articles, both in Russian and in English, I eagerly awaited feedback from various sources I hoped would find them of interest. And I am pleased to report that I did indeed receive a significant amount of feedback over the past two decades. In this supplement, I want to acquaint the readers with some of the feedback I received. Most of the feedback I received is in Russian, because most of my publications appeared in that language. Based on their content, these responses may be divided into three categories: 1. Laconic statements indicating that someone has read one of my publications. This is, of course, important, but as feedback it was not very helpful 2. Citations in other documents in which an argument or statement I made was used as a supporting or counterargument by another writer 3. Actual discussions of my views, with detailed analyses of the material

Feedback on My Semiotic Theory

309

The last type of feedback was of the greatest importance to me. This supplement briefly summarizes the feedback in this category that I have received. It is the only type of feedback I will include in this book.

The appraisal of D. S. Nazarkin The first response to my semiotic theories came from a Russian source. A student in one of the provincial universities, D. S. Nazarkin, wrote his dissertation on the topic of sign classifications. The dissertation was written and defended in 2003. Nazarkin compared various classifications proposed by semioticians and came to the following conclusion: The classification system proposed by Charles Peirce appeared more than 50 years ago, and is now accepted as the standard classification. Yet many scholars consider it inadequate, as it only constitutes a preliminary scheme, and does not really represent the conception of a mature semiotic or philosophic system. The classification of Solomonick is more deserving of the name, because in it the sign is viewed both from a semiotic and a philosophical position, and the classification itself has two parameters – analyses of signs and analyses of sign-systems.1

The dissertation of Ahmad Jaffar At the beginning of this century, I was invited to lecture on my semiotic theory at Staffordshire University in England. Soon after I presented my lecture and returned home, I re1

D. S. Nazarkin, The Problem of Sign Classifications. (Uljanovsk State Technical University, 2003). Available online at http://ling.ulstu.ru/sign/pnazarkin.doc. The translation into English is mine (A.S.).

310

Supplement I

ceived a letter from a man by the name of Ahmad Jaffar. In his letter, Jaffar told me that he had listened to my presentation and wanted to use my taxonomy in the doctoral thesis he was proposing. Of course, I had no wish to oppose his plan. A few years later, I was informed that he had successfully defended his dissertation and received his doctorate. Soon afterwards, I came across mention of his dissertation on the internet, and requested that he send me the dissertation. He obligingly sent the complete text to me by e-mail. Another paper published by Jaffar summarizes his approach to the use of semiotic principles in business-process models: SEMIOTIC NOTATION PRINCIPLES FOR BUSINESS PROCESS MODELLING Business Process Models use symbolic notations to represent business processes. Influenced by system engineering and mathematics, the application of these notations involves technical processes designed by engineers, undertaken by technically trained analysts for the use of largely technical people. However, the majority of business process stakeholders are non-technically inclined with a business or administrative background. While some notations are comprehensive, they can be visually and technically complex hindering effective understand. Others are arbitrary geometrical symbols where their intended semantics are unclear and confusing. While such representational constraints prevent effective communication of process knowledge, there is a lack of research evidence on theoretical principles justifying the choice and application of notations which can help to overcome the identified constraints. This paper proposes semiotics principles to overcome this deficiency in representing business process model. As the theoretical foundation for this proposal, it advocates the use of Peirce’s semiotics triadic principles and Solomonick’s principles on evolution of signs. A

Feedback on My Semiotic Theory

311

quantitative and qualitative comparative analysis confirmed that the proposed notation principles successfully identified the intuitively comprehensible notation and able to guide analysts to effectively model processes.2

I would like to expand on Jaffar’s comments, but in a less formal manner. Jaffar is a specialist in computer programming, and deals with the computerization of business-process models like models of banking operations or of systems for ordering airline tickets over the Internet. He perceives a problem in the evaluation of alternative models by non-technical decision-makers, because their understanding of the symbolic notations used to represent these models is limited. He understands that the answer to the problem lies in semiotics and cannot be found in the realm of programming itself. Because of this, he consults publications that relate to semiotics, and discovers that there are a variety of studies of signs. Among them, he finds two systems of sign classifications – the one put forward by Charles Peirce, and the one I proposed. Jaffar unites these two systems into a single system, and deems it suitable for his purpose. In his merger of the two classifications, he has six levels, just like my scheme has, but he uses Peirce’s classes for the lower levels, and mine for the higher levels. Jaffar designates each level of abstraction in this scheme with a number, from 1 to 6, increasing the values as the level of abstraction rises. By adding together the values of all the signs used in a particular business model, he derives a single number that he believes represents the degree of abstraction of that model. The lower the degree of abstraction, the more val-

2

Ahmad Jaffar, “Semiotic Notation Principles for Business Process Modelling,” http://is2.lse.ac.uk/asp/aspecis/20060168.pdf; accessed August 2013.

312

Supplement I

uable the system is assumed to be for non-professional executives. Jaffar’s method of reasoning seems somewhat simplistic to me. Firstly, it does not take the overlapping of the types of sign-systems, which I discussed in chapter 15 of this book, into consideration. Furthermore, the degree of abstraction of syntactic signs in a system can only be measured relative to one another; their level of abstraction does not belong to the same scale as the levels of abstraction of other signs in the system. Nonetheless, as a first attempt to apply mathematical methods to the analysis of abstraction in different signs, it is valuable, especially insomuch as it paved the way for further discussions of the issues involved. Jaffar’s innovation was discussed at many conferences, and the topic remains under constant deliberation. For our purposes, what is important is the fact that my taxonomy, in combination with Charles Peirce’s approach, were treated as basic concepts.

M. Urban incorporates my ideas into his methodology In 2008, M. Urban, a senior lecturer at the Technical State University in Minsk, Belorussia, published an article in the pedagogical journal, Primary School, about teaching arithmetic to second-grade children.3 From reading the article, I concluded that the author’s focus is the analysis and development of methods for teaching arithmetic to elementary-school children. In the article, Urban presents a scenario that is typical of elementary-school arithmetic classes: a teacher instructs the pupils to solve a problem in their arithmetic books. The exer3

M. Urban, “Solving Written Arithmetic Problems on the Basis of Semiotic,” in Primary School Journal, ʋ 9, 2008. ɍɪɛɚɧ Ɇ. ɉɨɢɫɤ ɪɟɲɟɧɢɹ ɬɟɤɫɬɨɜɵɯ ɡɚɞɚɱ ɧɚ ɨɫɧɨɜɟ ɫɟɦɢɨɬɢɱɟɫɤɨɝɨ ɩɨɞɯɨɞɚ. ɀɭɪɧɚɥ «ɉɚɱɚɬɤɨɜɚɹ ɲɤɨɥɚ», ʋ 9, 2008, Ɇɢɧɫɤ.

Feedback on My Semiotic Theory

313

cise presents the children with a common situation that is familiar to most of them from real life: Two children (A and B) went to the woods to gather mushrooms. A found 3 mushrooms, and B found 2. How many mushrooms did the two children find altogether?

Some of the youngsters perform this task quite easily; others manage it, but with difficulty; and some cannot do it at all. Urban then asks what should be done with the pupils in the last category. His answer lies within the sphere of semiotics, because semiotics gives criteria for ranking individual signs in order of their difficulty. He then cites my approach and analyzes my taxonomy of sign-systems. He says that the text of the arithmetic problem belongs to the fourth level of abstraction in my hierarchy, and that progressing from the text to performing the mathematical manipulations necessary to solve the problem further escalates the difficulty. Because of this, when children have difficulty with a problem of this sort, the teacher should approach the problem from an entirely different direction. That is, the teacher should present the problem using less abstract signs to make it easier for the pupils to understand. For this purpose, the teacher may choose to perform the manipulation with toy mushrooms, with pictures of mushrooms (these three + these two = …), or other forms of visual aids. When the teacher does this, the pupils will understand the internal logic of the algorithm they are applying.

Another mathematical confirmation of the theory In June 2007, the faculty of philosophy at the Moscow State University convened a conference dedicated to the philosophical problems of mathematics. At the conference, N. Trushkina presented a paper called “On the Parallelism be-

314

Supplement I

tween the Phylo- and Ontogenetic Developments of Mathematical Knowledge.”4 In her paper, Trushkina refers to my taxonomy,5 and relates specifically to the idea that patterns of semiotic development in phylogenetic human development are repeated in the ontogenesis of individuals. Trushkina confirms this contention, citing examples from the history of mathematics, a very formalized and abstract branch of science. In my books, I have also paid special attention to this issue, and I was very pleased to receive confirmation of this sort from a professional in the field.

Confirmation from juristic language A number of articles by Natalia Kovkel, a professor of law from Minsk (Belorussia), have appeared recently on the internet. Their topic can be defined as “semiotic analyses of juridical language.” She writes on the peculiarity of juridical language, its tendency towards transparency and exactness at one and the same time. She is of the opinion that analyses of this aspect of juristic language require help from semiotics. For this purpose, she examines a number of different semiotic theories, and reaches the following conclusion: “… the most useful for our purpose is the approach of A. Solomonick, who, having come to the decision to classify types of sign-systems

4

N. Trushkina, “On the Parallelism between the Phylo- and Ontogenetic Developments of Mathematical Knowledge,” http://www.philos.msu.ru/fac/dep/scient/confdpt/2007/theses/trushk ina.pdf; accessed August 2013. 5 See Semiotic taxonomy and classifications, pages 31-36.

Feedback on My Semiotic Theory

315

rather than single signs, organized them all into a five-staged hierarchy.”6 Kovkel then provides a very detailed presentation of my theory. Her final summary of the issue is this: “Semiotic analyses of all of these signs and sign-systems will bring about a deeper understanding of judicial facts and processes and will enrich jurisprudence with new discoveries about laws and their development.”

Approval from culturologists This last item is of great emotional importance to me. When I wrote my first monograph on semiotics, “Language as a System of Signs” (Moscow, 1992), in which the first version of my approach was elucidated, I presented a copy of it to my friend, the late professor of philosophy Anatoly Karmin, of St. Petersburg. At the time, he was writing a guide to culturology, which became very popular as soon as it was published. Karmin had a very high opinion of my views, and included my taxonomy of sign-systems in his work, employing it as the foundation of his presentation of the different cultorologic epochs in human life: the epoch of natural culture, the epoch of preverbal iconic culture, and so on. Although he incorporated some of his own ideas into the hierarchy, the scheme as a whole was preserved, and he clearly identified its source in the chapter dedicated to the classification of different cultures. His premature death some years ago was a great blow to all of his friends and admirers; in light of it, my recollection of his attitude towards my semiotic theory is emotionally 6

Natalia Kovkel, “Basic Elements of the Legal Language Structure” http://www.jurvestnik.psu.ru/index.php/en; accessed August 2013. The translation into English is mine (A.S.). Note that I originally only differentiated between five types of sign-systems; I now identify six.

316

Supplement I

charged for me personally. I mention this here and in the dedication on the title page as a token of my reverence towards him and his memory.

SUPPLEMENT II INTRODUCING THE GENERAL THEORY INTO BRANCH SEMIOTICS

In this supplement, I will report on my attempts to establish bridges between the principles of general semiotics I have described in this book and some existing systems of branch semiotics. My efforts in these areas serve as test cases of a sort for my theoretical conclusions. Naturally, I could not try to apply my theory to a discipline until I became familiar with it, its history, and its current ideas. I therefore limited my undertaking to three fields of endeavor: cartography, philosophy, and pedagogy. The material I am presenting in this supplement concerns my attempts to apply my theories in these three fields. This material provides additional data on the applicability of my theoretical concepts, along with the external feedback I presented in the previous supplement.

Cartosemiotics Some years ago, I began to study cartography. Cartography is a discipline that is based exclusively on signs of a distinctive character. This fact, coupled with its long history and its practical value, made it seem like an ideal field for me to become acquainted with and to apply my theory to. I began by perusing a wide range of cartographic sources, and then I tried my hand at composing original papers about the ties between semiotics and cartography. After prolonged consultations with professional cartographers, I presented some of my papers to

318

Supplement II

them for publication. While these works were accepted without enthusiasm, they were also accepted without opposition. Indeed, our mutual cooperation has since accelerated, because modern cartography currently finds itself in something of a crisis. The cartography of today is clearly in a state of “scientific revolution,” in the sense Thomas Kuhn had in mind in his The Structure of Scientific Revolution:1 it is in the process of changing its scientific paradigm. With the advance of digital mapping technologies, and the successful use of satellite data for mapping the Earth, people are in doubt about whether paper maps and atlases will remain in use much longer. This state of uncertainty can easily be observed in discussions on the Internet, and is even more noticeable at cartographers’ meetings. In their perplexity, cartographers have been seeking help from specialists outside of their field of expertise, and particularly from the field of semiotics. That is why they are so open to laymen coming to instruct them in their own métier. After a number of preliminary attempts, I succeeded in formulating a kind of semiotic approach to the cartographers’ concerns. I can briefly summarize my formulation as follows: In my opinion, the newly developed methods of navigation, both those that guide us on our own planet and those that map the heavens, belong to the field of cartography. However, these new methods do not replace the old ones. Rather, they enhance the established techniques with additional options and possibilities that were not available earlier. Cartography has now reached a stage in its development in which the old methods for orienting ourselves in our immediate vicinities appear unreliable, while new cartographic technologies can do a better job. 1

See page 24.

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

319

Before I develop this idea further, I think it is important to define what cartography is, from the standpoint of my theory of general semiotics. In my framework, cartography belongs to the notational class of sign-systems. It is the consummation of a long process of developing tools to help people orient themselves in space, a process which began with the invention and perfecting of a number of models that were found to be useful for this purpose. Formalizing these models took long centuries of preparatory work that culminated in today’s notions. We have now arrived at an era in which this established earth-based cartography is being revitalized at a very fast pace by other types of orientation methods. To delineate these new types of cartography, I suggested the use of a Cartesian system of coordinates with three axes, like this:

Cartesian System of Coordinates

Figure II-1

We can use this system of coordinates to distinguish between different types of cartography. For each cartographic system, we can define a number of parameters:

320

Supplement II

1. Where the origin of the axes – the central point of the system, the vantage point of the observer, marked with an O in the diagram above – is situated 2. What the target of the system will be – the field of observation, the region within the space defined by the three axes (x, y, z) of coordinates that is the object being modeled by the cartographic system 3. Whether point O will always remain in one place or will move with the system 4. Whether the field of observation will always remain in one place or will move around within the system If the central point, O, represents the vantage point of a person on the Earth’s surface, and the target of their gaze is on the earth (on the surface, or slightly above or below it), the system is a standard form of earth cartography. This is a type of system we know well, and it is based on conventional mathematical models. The basic signs of such systems are images, but images with various degrees of abstraction, ranging from the low level of abstraction of simple drawings to the much higher degree of abstraction of topographic and cartographic symbols. Early forms of earth cartography only employed the simple drawings and basic topographic symbols, but over time the initial forms evolved into the standard models that are employed in today’s maps. Indeed, although some early cartographic notations remain usable and effective to this day, most currently belong exclusively to the realm of cartographic history. Now let us consider a different scenario, in which point O represents the vantage point of a person flying high above the earth in an airplane, or orbiting the earth in a satellite. Once again, the target of observation is the earth, but this time, because of the observer’s location, a new kind of earth cartography must be created. This is the nature of two new forms of cartography, GIS (geographic informational systems) and

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

321

GPS (geographic positional systems). Both of these systems are earth-cartography models, but because their vantage point differs from that of the standard form of earth cartography described above, they have different semiotic fields. The development of these new forms of cartography has increased the sum total of all the images available for use in cartography, both as basic cartographic signs and as operators for the mathematical models of cartographic systems. Among the new cartographic signs that are now in use in these systems are picture-type images and machine-generated drawings of projected itineraries. These signs are used in car navigation systems because they are relatively easy for untrained users to interpret. After we develop a method for transforming signs in a particular way, we often construct mechanical tools to perform the mathematical transformations for us. Car navigation systems are one illustration of this thesis. In essence, the system remains earth cartography, but because of its vantage point and purpose, it has a distinct kind of basic signs and an alternative mathematical foundation. Let us proceed to a third scenario: If point O represents the vantage point of a person on earth, one who is unmovable and is looking towards a particular region of the sky, we will get another kind of cartography – not earth cartography, but sky cartography. To signify the celestial bodies in our field of vision, we use much more abstract images (e.g., asterisks to represent stars in the sky), and we employ special mathematical models to work with them. The main difference between this form of cartography and the ones we discussed above, is that the time factor plays a decisive role in this cartography; the field of observation changes from one moment to the next, and the system must accommodate these changes. In the future, we can expect other types of cartography to come into existence – special mapping systems for use in space flight, for mapping the surfaces of other celestial bod-

322

Supplement II

ies, etc. Each of these cartographic systems will differ from our conventional earth cartography, but they will fit somewhere in the system of coordinates. The differences in their signs and sign-systems will all be functions of the four factors enumerated above (vantage point of the observer, object of observation, and whether either one of these is fixed or moveable). It is perfectly natural that humanity began its formulation of cartography with the cartography of the planet we live on. But now we are emerging into cosmic space and have to seek tools for dealing with all the new challenges we are encountering there. One of these challenges is the mapping of the cosmos and of various celestial bodies – and every new development in this realm will demand new types of signs and sign-systems. This is not only a matter of theoretical interest. Today, all cartographies are treated as part of a single branch of science – namely, as outgrowths of geography. But this should not be the case. Every sphere of cartography should be able to devise its own paradigm of actions, based on its particular requirements and goals. Some cartographies really are related to geography, but others concern cosmology, which is built on very different foundations; and yet others, like the navigational cartography of the earth, would produce better results, if they were treated as parts of information theory or of systems of communication. We will be better able to train specialists for each kind of cartography, if we break with the traditional view that all forms of cartography belong exclusively to geography. If we remove cartography from the field of geography, and treat it as a field in its own right, every branch of cartography will be able to have its own distinct mathematical foundation. I have heard many complaints from cosmological cartographers about the fact that cartographers are currently trained exclusively at educational institutions that deal with geography.

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

323

The cosmological cartographers have told me that the educations they received at these institutions were deficient, so that they had to learn about their field of expertise on their own and at their own initiative. It is also high time that the various disciplines that currently share the nomination “geo-,” like geology and geography, be given new names that better reflect their actual subject matter. Geo in Greek means the planet Earth, and nothing else. The study of the moon should be called selenology, because that is what it really is; likewise, the study of Mars should be called marsology. Our habits of referring to these fields as “geography of the moon” or “geography of Mars” are absurdities, to say the least. We have already broken the tethers to our Mother Earth; it is time we adjusted our terminology to better suit this irreversible circumstance.

Philosophical issues of a semiotic character For over twenty years, I have been dealing with topics that belong to the field of semiotics. Many of the semiotic issues I have discussed during this lengthy period of time are near the boundary between semiotics and philosophy. Some of the problems I have dealt with belong primarily to the field of semiotics, while others are largely part of the field of philosophy; and some are roughly equal mixtures of both fields. In this section, I will focus on those issues that are essentially philosophical in nature. I have chosen to only discuss a few of the topics I have considered over the years; I have tried to select the most important ones for this purpose. I know that I am repeating some material that appears earlier in this book, but it is presented here from somewhat different angle. The most important of these philosophic issues is, in my opinion, my theory of semiotic reality. I will begin by considering a few of the philosophic implications of this theory. After that, I will also discuss a few other topics that are correlat-

324

Supplement II

ed with philosophy: the distinction between a classification and a taxonomy, the nature of a scientific paradigm, and the notion of the conceptual grid. Classical paradoxes and semiotic reality Earlier in this book, I introduced an innovation I call semiotic reality. At this point, I want to underscore the philosophical significance of this concept. I will do this by looking at a number of well-known ancient philosophical paradoxes from the perspective of this concept. The classic philosophical paradoxes were introduced in ancient Greece. The famous Greek philosopher, Zeno of Elea, who was known for his paradoxes, lived in the 5th and 4th centuries BC. Zeno was a follower of Parmenides, who was also from the city of Elea. Parmenides wanted to prove that nothing ever changes in time or in substance. This idea contradicted the information people received from their senses, so a lot of people opposed his views. Zeno, on the other hand, strongly supported Parmenides’ theory. In Zeno’s writings, he presented a number of paradoxes which he believed “proved” that nothing ever changed; the opposing view derived exclusively from incorrect impressions that people had gotten because of the imperfection of human sensory data. After Zeno’s time, a long series of paradoxes were conceived. These paradoxes were designed to show that what common sense tells us cannot be reconciled with philosophy and science. In modern times, Bertrand Russell collected the paradoxes of Zeno and declared them extremely ingenious and profound. He also added some examples of his own to them. A number of other philosophers have also pursued this line of thinking. I believe that the concept of semiotic reality can solve all of these discrepancies with a single stroke. Before I explain this, let us have a look at one additional source.

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

325

Semiotic reality and theological paradoxes Willy Kreimer is a philosopher who emigrated from Russia to Israel. Some years ago, I received an e-mail from him in which he said that he had read one of my articles on the Internet, and had included a kind of review of it in his new book.2 The article in which he included this review was about the difference between the two types of realities, ontological reality and semiotic reality. The following is an excerpt from what he wrote. Since the original text is in Russian, I present it here in my own translation: Lately, the theory of signs got a significant push from the Israeli scientist, Abraham Solomonick. In his work, “On the Disparities between Ontology and Semiotic Reality,” he introduces the notion of semiotic reality and scrutinizes the interaction between the two planes… In the course of creating semiotic reality, people invented signs and sign-systems that did not have counterparts in ontology, and these latter comprise a very considerable part of culture – mythology, religion, art, and a great portion of science. Thus, semiotic reality has reached far from its initial boundaries. It has become a thing in its own right and is beginning to make inroads into sciences, arts, and literature, not only for practical purposes, but also for ethereal philosophizing and self-indulgence. In ontology, new assertions are tested via practice; in semiotics, this is replaced by other criteria: the theory’s completeness, how comfortable it is to work with and apply, its harmony, the beauty of its contents, and how well it fits what already exists. These are no less important than its practical usefulness, but only within the framework of semiotics itself.

2

Willy Kreimer, Psychology and Symbols of the Jewish People, http://peoples-peace.blogspot.com/2010/07/blog-post_13.html; accessed September 2010.

326

Supplement II

Solomonick’s deductions from the above are: both types of realities are in principle alike, they depend on one another, but at the same time they are autonomous in their essence and are developed through their own laws… Separating these two planes allows him to avoid the cul-de-sacs into which Zeno, Russell, and Henry Bergson lead us by not discriminating between the rules of sign transformations in ontology and those in semiotic reality. The seemingly incontestable discrepancies from the point of view of logical positivism are senseless, if we apply the concepts of the two differing realities. Let us look, for example, at the paradox B. Russell uses in the article, “Why I am not a Christian.” In it, he asks: “Can God create a stone that He won’t be able to lift?” We see some notions from ontology in this — can, create, stone, and lift. On the other hand, he uses the notion of God, which is taken from theology (purely semiotic reality). This implies the meaning Almighty, though it cannot be proven in ontology. As a result, we merge quite different and incompatible meanings from the two planes of thinking, which makes the answer unattainable. From the impossibility of the answer follows the logical incompatibility of the formulation of the paradox.

The paradox of Achilles and the tortoise Let us now look at Zeno’s trademark paradox about Achilles and the tortoise. The general idea of the paradox is as follows: Achilles and the tortoise decide to compete in a race. Naturally, Achilles gives his opponent a head start, and then he starts to run. In a short period of time, say, half an hour, he covers the entire distance between the starting line and the tortoise, but when he arrives at the tortoise’s location, the tortoise has already moved forward, so Achilles has not caught up to it. In the next leg of the race, Achilles once again nearly reaches the tortoise, yet the tortoise also keeps moving, and is a bit ahead of Achilles when he arrives at the tortoise’s loca-

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

327

tion. So it goes, on and on, in the same way, endlessly: Achilles seems to overrun his rival, but the rival nevertheless succeeds in moving forward just a little bit further while Achilles is catching up to it, so Achilles never manages to catch it. According to mathematics, this process will never come to an end – the distance between Achilles and the tortoise becomes infinitesimally smaller with each additional leg of the race, but the tortoise always stays slightly ahead. This conclusion decisively contradicts the reality in which we live. It is clear to everybody that Achilles can easily overrun his lumbering opponent. It is only in the mathematical model of the situation that this truth does not hold. For nearly two thousand years, this conundrum has captivated philosophers. But it can easily be resolved if we understand that what is correct in semiotic reality can sometimes be wrong in ontology. It is not always wrong, of course, but it can be wrong. If we apply the proper math to Zeno’s scenario, we can easily solve the problem. If you formulate the correct mathematical conditions to this paradox (it is not difficult), you will be able to handle the problem in a trice. The same distinction between a scenario in semiotic reality and its corresponding scenario in ontology can show us the way out of all the complications that logical extensions can introduce. The role of semiotic reality in extracting scientific knowledge In actuality, the theory of semiotic reality I created is a new philosophical theory of knowledge, comprising not only the subject and the object in the process of the creation of new knowledge, but also the functioning of signs in this process, because signs have a very active and decisive part in it. I see the role of signs in this process as follows: 1. Signs play a central part in the beginning stage of every research project, because they provide researchers with

328

Supplement II

knowledge about what has already been accomplished in their sphere of interest. This knowledge is retrieved from semiotic reality. 2. Signs substantiate the guesses of the researcher in the course of observation and experimentation, because, as Norbert Wiener wrote, “If there is any one quality which marks the competent mathematician more than any other, I think it is the power to operate with temporary emotional symbols and to organize out of them a semi-permanent, recallable language. If one is not able to do this, one is likely to find that his ideas evaporate from the sheer difficulty of preserving them in an as yet unformulated shape.”3 For this purpose, signs may be purely individual and belong exclusively to the researcher; other people need not be acquainted with them at all. 3. Once the research has advanced sufficiently for hypotheses to be framed, they must be reformulated using signs that are intelligible to other people. It is at this point that personal signs devised by the researcher are replaced with signs that are recognized by many other people. This must occur in order for new knowledge to become public. 4. In order to facilitate the publication of new knowledge, many existing sign-systems are constantly reviewed and improved in quality, in an effort to make them more easily understandable and meaningful to as many people as possible. This is true primarily of the systems that I call codes of codes, which are used to help pro3

Norbert Wieiner, I Am a Mathematician. (London: Gollancz, 1956), http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Robert_RootBernstein /publication/248962073_Aesthetic_cognition/links/00b4951f6d449 7521a000000.pdf, pp.85-86.

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

329

cess all the other sign-systems.4 The systems that belong to this group are languages, mathematics, and various types of logic. At any given moment, thousands of scientists are busy working to hone existing signsystems of these types. Nonetheless, many other active sign-systems also undergo non-stop improvement. 5. The name of a sign and the identity of its referent remain fixed, regardless of changes that may occur to that referent in ontological reality and of improvements made to the sign-system in semiotic reality. All other aspects of a sign can change over time. The improvements discussed in the previous item are one example of such adjustments. They primarily concern modifications to the properties of an existing sign – adaptations to its meaning and the way it functions within its signsystem. In addition, the syntactic relations of signs are always subject to review and revision. 6. Every sign belongs at one and the same time both to semiotic reality in general and to its own sign-system in particular. Within its own sign-system, a sign always occupies an exact position in the hierarchy of signs. This promotes optimal functioning of the system and places the concrete signs of the system correctly. But this is possible only within the framework of a concrete sign-system that governs the role and the weight of each proper name, notion, and concept within it. 7. Practical implementation of the results of scientific research and testing also requires the use of signs to create diagrams and drawings of innovations in the field. Annotations in words, and explanatory mathematical calculations, are usually attached to the diagrams and drawings. 4

See “Codes of codes,” page 342.

330

Supplement II

All of these capacities are functions of semiotic reality. In ontological reality, they do not exist; only the particular objects and contours we see in our environment can be said to exist in ontological reality. The distinction between a taxonomy and a classification system Defining the distinction between a taxonomy and a classification system is also a longstanding problem which philosophers of science have tried unsuccessfully to solve. I proposed my formulation of the solution above.5 Briefly, it is as follows: a taxonomy is an initial and preliminary categorization that is intended to evolve over time into a practical and cogent classification system. It is natural that at the stage when someone puts forward a new theory, a theory that may later evolve into a mature and self-sustained branch of science, he cannot give a solid classification of the objects of study. A proper classification can only be created after long and strenuous investigations. That is why the initial theorist only suggests a rough and very approximate division of classes and subclasses within his subject matter. It is this division that I call a taxonomy. It is clear that the taxonomy must be logically coherent from the outset, but it inevitably mixes qualities of objects that in the future, when the theory is more fleshed out, will be separated into different classes. Classifications, which have better foundations than taxonomies, come into existence after preliminary taxonomies and replace them. The replacement process is continuous and gradual, and, as it progresses, the groups (taxons or classes) become more and more homogeneous. Homogeneousness is the key notion in the whole process. Only when we arrive at

5

See page 169.

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

331

homogeneous collections of signs in each class can we say that we have achieved a real classification. A good example of this is the history of classification in the field of botany (a very ancient science). The first botanical “classification” was proposed in ancient Greece by Theophrastus (circa 300 BC), who has been called the “father of botany.” Theophrastus identified and classified about 550 different plants. He classified them into four categories: trees, shrubs, under shrubs, and herbs. Is this a real classification, from a modern point of view? Yes and no. It is only a preliminary classification – one that prompted further research in the field. The real classifications of plants were worked out much later and they are founded on much more precisely defined plant properties. Little by little, the classification system of botany has become more stringent and each of the classes has become more homogeneous; as it went through these improvements, it gradually ousted the earlier taxonomy from its position. The work of honing the classes of any branch of science is endless, continuing whenever there is a new revelation of any kind in that branch. Thus, the distinction I have drawn between taxonomies and classifications is valid for the philosophy of science as a general rule. The content of a scientific paradigm I have already written a great deal about scientific paradigms in chapter 2 above, and I have already included the diagram below, which shows what I view as the content of the paradigm in any mature science. Nonetheless, because I consider this subject to be of great importance, and to be related to philosophy, I am including the diagram and a brief summary of the topic here.

Supplement II

332

Paradigm of a Mature Science

Means of verification

Philosophical underpinnings

Metalanguages Conceptual grid and terminology

Formal axiomatics (if possible)

Taxonomies and classifications

Figure II-2

This diagram contains a breakdown of the parts of general semiotics as I imagine them. The parts are presented in order of their development, beginning at “12 o’clock” and progressing in the direction of the arrow. The scheme is the result of a great deal of research and thought on my part, and I have revised the contents several times. Even so, I am sure that in the future I will again change the structure, or that somebody else will suggest a better one. If that happens, I will be very happy. We need a pattern of some sort to enable us to appraise the maturity of any scientific theory that claims to be the foundation of a new science. Indeed, we also need to be able to appraise the maturity of existing sciences. For these reasons, this attempt to present some kind of scientific paradigm seems to be worthwhile.

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

333

The conceptual grid and its philosophical meaning Approximately two decades ago, I proposed a distinction between the terms notion and concept. At that time, the two terms were used indiscriminately, and I wanted to attach different semiotic content to each of them. I defined “concept” as a very important notion for the construction of scientific signsystems. In the course of a sign-system’s development, some of its notions attain a leading role in the system as a whole and coalescent into the framework that remains unchanged despite the system’s ever-changing content. These notions fill the role of the supporting structure of the system, like the beams of a house. Their composition usually remains intact while the other, subsidiary notions are constantly shuffled around as they change their positions and relative weights. They also defend the system from infiltration by extraneous things. Novelties may seem very enticing, but if they do not match the conceptual framework of the system, they must be rejected by it. After a few years of hesitation, I decided to call this framework a conceptual grid. When a lecturer or an author of a manual begins to explain a scientific discipline, he usually briefly defines some of its central concepts, and returns to discuss them in more detail later on. The central concepts form the conceptual grid of the field. It is these concepts that would serve as headings in a terminological dictionary of a science, while the other terms in the dictionary would be auxiliary notions.

Semiodidactics Being a pedagogue by profession, I feel most confident in that sphere, and I have proposed a number of far-reaching educational projects based on my theory of general semiotics. I will present two of these proposals here: “‘Signs around us’ –

334

Supplement II

a plan for a new school subject,” and “Reformation of the secondary school curriculum.” I introduced the first proposal in 2007, and the second one quite recently. In connection with the second proposal, I coined the term semiodidactics, which means the pedagogic application of the principles of general semiotics. “Signs around us” – a plan for a new school subject Today, most of the disciplines in the school curriculum are borrowed from the corresponding branches of science. The physics that is taught in schools is a sort of replica of the science of physics, and the same is true of chemistry, history, botany, geography, and many other fields. This framework is typical of the bulk of school subjects. I propose that a new discipline be added to the standard school curriculum, one that deals with the signs that are used by people in various walks of life. The subject matter would include explanations of the signs used in different fields of endeavor, adjusted to the level of cognition and the age of the children. My suggested program would include signs from the following realms: 1. Signs of the national alphabet (origin of the alphabet, its history, its modern contents, and the forms in which it appears) 2. Systems of counting (natural numbers, the decimal system and other systems, the history of counting systems, lettering and other non-figurative systems of counting, counting with fingers, the use of letters as variables in algebra and other mathematical sciences) 3. Body language (gestures, postures that are used as signs, mimicking, manners and etiquette) 4. Signs of honor and esteem (ethics and its origins, some signs related to traditions of ethics, rules of behavior at school and in the classroom)

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

335

5. Signs in the immediate surroundings (signs in the street; trademarks for different products; hairdos, tattoos, and piercing as signs) 6. Signs of products’ quality, maintenance, and use (instructions on products you buy, markings on food products, clothing labels and tags, etc.) 7. Signs in games and sports (table games, signs in various sports, Olympic symbolism, etc.) 8. Collecting and collections (collections of badges, numismatics, philately, collections of postcards) 9. Signs in various sciences (easily discernable and understandable signs in cartography, physics, chemistry, and biology) 10. Signs in music (some notion of musical notations; notes of the octave; some musical instruments; biographies of national composers and famous musicians) 11. Signs in the arts (pictures and drawing; history of art in the country; applied arts in national culture; outstanding artists and works of art) 12. National symbols (coat-of arms, flag and anthem; main state ceremonies and their symbolism; documents of citizenship) As you can see at a glance, a lot of the things mentioned above are not studied in schools at all, in spite of their practical value and general importance. One distinctive aspect of this plan is that the teaching of each subject is intended to be oriented towards the specific environment of each school, both in terms of its national affiliation and its local, geographical setting. Since at the moment there are very few teachers capable of teaching this subject matter in its entirety, specialists would have to be trained for the purpose. This last point is the reason that everyone I spoke to about this project refused to implement it in practice.

336

Supplement II

Reformation of the secondary school curriculum The second project I am introducing here is even more ambitious than the first, but it is also much easier to implement. It concerns the reformation of the secondary-school curriculum, which is currently the object of severe criticism in every country I am familiar with. Before I begin, let me clarify some of the terminology I will use in my discussion. First of all, I differentiate between two concepts: curriculum and syllabus. By curriculum I mean the general teaching plan of a particular selection of subjects in a specific educational institution; by syllabus I mean a plan for teaching a concrete discipline, such as “medicine” or “history.” Secondly, I also distinguish between a discipline – meaning a school subject that corresponds to a complete scientific field, like botany, mathematics, or geography – and a topic – meaning a concrete theme of study that unites features from various sciences, like “caring for our environment” or “home collections.” For simplicity, I sometimes call disciplines and topics school subjects or just subjects, when the distinction between them is not of importance. Keeping these preliminary remarks in mind, we may now move on to the substance of this project. Semiotic description of the problem One of the first conclusions we can draw from general semiotics is that, as our endeavors (including our educational enterprises) advance and mature, their signs advance and mature with them. In particular, the signs we master in the course of our constant and unending learning processes gradually become more abstract as we progress. These are processes that take place both within school and outside of it. While it is true that any sequential pursuit of knowledge proceeds from the less abstract to the more abstract, it is also true that the pace at which the knowledge becomes more ab-

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

337

stract varies from one venture to another. Every human activity differs from all others both in terms of the speed of signdevelopment and the pace of the increase in abstractness. Throughout human history, and especially in recent times, the activity that has developed the most quickly is scientific activity; it expands in a most wondrous way, and during the last few centuries, it has changed our lives tremendously, turning our former bare-bones existence into something very different. Its achievements to date cannot be underestimated, and, as it progressed, it learned to use very abstract signs to help it progress. In this respect, by comparison with scientific activities, all other forms of human endeavor seem deficient. Other, more practical ventures require a much more simplified point of view; they use much less complicated methods for dealing with reality and much less abstract signs. Another important realm of human enterprise, religion, relies on beliefs rather than demonstrable findings, and rejects further improvements to what has already been accepted as truth. Even the educational sphere has followed this disappointing trend. Taking no initiative of its own, it has become completely dependent on scientific progress. It focuses almost entirely on science as the source of its subject matter, to the point that most school disciplines are simplified versions of sciences that bear the same names. The advances of science are so impressive that they tend to quash all other considerations in the selection of study material for school education. It is taken for granted that most school disciplines should be based on branches of science. Botany should be taught in schools as it is formulated in science, or, at any rate, as a clone of the main features of scientific botany; geography should only be taught in its cartographic form, while its topographic level, which is nearer to what we see in our real lives, should be ignored; and so it

338

Supplement II

goes for most other fields. The more closely a school subject matches the contemporary state of a science, the better it is considered to be. It is felt that schools should not deviate from the classifications of science or omit even one of its important offshoots. This also means that we have to teach all the significant features and concepts of the sciences, however abstract they are, even though schoolchildren cannot possibly understand them at their age. I am not against using the scientific approach as one of the main guidelines for setting up a school curriculum; after all, science is ultimately the driving force behind our survival in the world. I am only against applying it in an unrestricted and inappropriate way. I want to define limits for it, and to regulate how it is applied to different age groups, especially since the scientific approach as it is understood today is not free of contradictions and drawbacks. When school disciplines are predetermined to be replicas of scientific fields, as is usually done, they very often do not coincide with the actual interests of many of the pupils. Such disciplines are approached by pupils as formal requirements that they only study because they are included in the school curriculum; they do not study them of their own volition but because they must master them for matriculation. Many of us, years after graduating, think back on our school years and reflect that a lot of time was spent worthlessly on one subject or another for no apparent reason. Even the order in which the material is presented is defined by the needs of the science rather than the pupils’ developmental needs. Even more significantly, much of the material taught in schools is presented in a form that is simply beyond the children’s cognitive abilities. The sciences have quickly reached the point that it is not possible for the majority of school children to master them at their early age. It is beyond their capacity to grasp these subjects not only because they penetrate

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

339

deeply into the topics, but also because they present a world that is vastly different from what we observe in our day-today reality. Consequently, people who are inclined to see reality simply as it appears before them find themselves confused and frustrated by the picture painted by the sciences. It is for these reasons that I propose modifying the intermediate level of school education by replacing disciplines (botany, geography, physics, etc.) with topics that incorporate science in a more intelligible form. Thus, the intermediatelevel curriculum I propose would contain topics like Growing Plants or Our Fruit and Vegetable Garden instead of Botany, and Great Voyages and Discoveries instead of Geography. (See my list of suggested topics below). Only at the highschool level will we encounter complete disciplines of the kind that are now included both in the intermediate and higher levels of schooling. Even in high school, these disciplines should only be taught as special subjects for individual students who are interested in them and capable of handling them. Topics vs. school disciplines at the intermediate level of school education At the intermediate level, I think topics have definite advantages over the disciplines as they are taught now. The current approach frequently presents material using its most abstract signs and notions. This is very difficult for children at this stage of schooling. In fact, this type of presentation will remain beyond some of them permanently, and will thus remain useless. But even high-school students who choose to focus on a particular science must have it presented to them in a more coherent form.

340

Supplement II

Proposed topics Here is a list of 20 topics that I propose introducing at the intermediate level of schooling. This list is neither complete nor obligatory. Every educationalist is free to improve it or even completely reject it. Its only aim is to give readers an idea of what I mean by the notion of topics. 1. Inventions that changed our world 2. Battles that affected human history 3. Conquering the cosmos 4. Caring for our environment 5. Healthy body and healthful behavior 6. First aid and home remedies 7. Healthy food and healthful eating 8. Animals and humans 9. Domestic animals and pets 10. Growing plants 11. Great voyages and discoveries 12. Ancient civilizations (Egypt, Assyria and Babylonia, ancient Greece and Rome, China, India, Inca, etc.: a short history of a particular ancient country or culture. 13. Museums and home collections 14. Particular architectural monuments 15. Deciphering dead languages 16. Systems of writing 17. Systems of counting 18. Systems of measurement 19. History of clothing fashions 20. History of money and financial institutions

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

341

This list is not final and will, surely, be expanded if my proposal is implemented. The directions in which it will expand depend in part on what it is decided to retain of the current school curriculum. The most convincing argument on behalf of the proposed topics is the fact that they will conquer the hearts of the pupils in the intermediate grades. Their attractiveness, in comparison with long and tedious disciplines, is so obvious, that it would be a great omission not to teach them to the younger generations. Disciplines that cannot be removed from school curricula Now that the concept of topics is understood, we must consider how they should be introduced into an existing curriculum. First, we must take into account that some of the disciplines that are currently part of school curricula must remain there even when topics are introduced. These disciplines can be divided into two groups: core disciplines and characterbuilding disciplines. Each of these groups can be further divided into subjects. I call the most prominent of these the leading disciplines of the secondary-school curriculum. It is these subjects that cannot be removed from the curriculum. The core disciplines are disciplines without which other sign-systems could not be created or disseminated. These are disciplines that cannot be removed from the curriculum because they lie at the basis of all our knowledge. They can be divided into two categories: codes of codes and retrieval tools. Codes of codes is the name that I use in my semiotic works for the sign-systems that make it possible for all other signsystems to function. Two disciplines belong to this category: national languages and mathematics. Languages, in both their oral and written forms, are necessary both to bring most other sign-systems into existence and to explain them. Mathematics is required for all the calculations that are performed in vari-

342

Supplement II

ous sign-systems. In pedagogy, this means that the disciplines in the school curriculum that correspond to these fields of study must be given a special place; that is, national languages and mathematics must be studied and mastered in all their possible ramifications for school children throughout the entire period of schooling. In fact, we should continue to improve our knowledge of our mother tongues and of mathematics throughout our lives. The second category of the core disciplines, retrieval tools, contains two other disciplines: computer use and foreign languages. These are fields that give us the means to receive the existing information that is being disseminated throughout the world. The skills and methods for finding and retrieving required information are necessary prerequisites for the modern lifestyle, and we must do our best to teach youngsters the appropriate ones. Admittedly, the task of gleaning information with the help of computers and foreign languages is smaller in scope than that of learning native languages and mathematics. Accordingly, these subjects can be allotted less time in the curriculum than the first two. But their importance still gives them a significant value and role. Character-building disciplines, the second group of disciplines that require special treatment and should be given a leading role in the curriculum, include subjects that are oriented more to the upbringing of schoolchildren than to providing them with knowledge. The aim of these subjects is to turn the pupils into decent citizens and to introduce them to the traditions and ideals of earlier generations. These goals are no less important for schools than the object of inculcating the knowledge and techniques that can assist the children to cope with their natural and social surroundings. For the realization of these goals, special disciplines exist that should be represented in every school curriculum.

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

343

The exact scope and content of this second type of discipline must be defined separately in each society. It should be based on the reigning views of what an all-around educated and cultured person, a worthy future member of that particular society, should know and be like. One approach to this would be to find ways to develop and improve the main facets of human nature – to find ways to help create a person who is knowledgeable, physically healthy, aesthetically aware, morally stable, and patriotic. In every school curriculum, we find subjects that are primarily oriented towards achieving these aims: 1. Subjects that are aimed at procuring knowledge 2. Sports and other physically demanding activities to help keep pupils physically fit 3. Drawing, singing, music, and other aesthetically oriented disciplines 4. National history, national geography, traditional religion, and sometimes even purely moral instruction for inculcating ethical and patriotic ideals. Subjects of these kinds (as well as the core disciplines) should be present in every school curriculum. In fact, they can be introduced either in the form of disciplines or topics, as I will discuss below. Three levels of school education and how they should be organized It is normal in most countries to divide the school years into three stages: primary school, intermediate grades (middle school), and high school. This division reflects the gradual maturing of pupils and the consequent expansion of the expectations of the educational authorities and the public at large. As a result, many aspects of the teaching process – the content, the degree of abstractness of the signs used, and the

Supplement II

344

methods of teaching – are also altered as we advance from one level to the next. By changing our approach to school education in the ways I described above, we would be able to solve many issues related to the whole of secondary-school education. The primary school would provide the initial skills for further schooling. The intermediate level would use these skills for mastering the basic levels of the knowledge that is needed for practical purposes in everyday life. Those pupils who desire to immerse themselves in the depths of the theoretical and abstract implications of certain scientific specialties would find a suitable framework in high school. And if even that did not satisfy some of them as their intellects matured, they would continue their studies in an institute of higher education. To clarify what I mean, I have created the following diagram:

Three Levels of School (Primary, Intermediate, and High School) 2 3 1

Figure II-3

1. Leading disciplines, primarily 2. Leading and specialized disciplines and specific topics 3. Leading disciplines and scientific or theoretical disciplines that are relevant to the particular interests and characteristics of the class

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

345

The diagram shows the three consecutive levels of school education: primary school, middle school, and high school. In individual countries, these levels vary in terms of duration, study contents, and learning methods, but they share the same basic properties, which are summarized briefly on the right side of the diagram. The heights of the bars represent the approximate duration of schooling at each stage; needless to say, the actual values vary from country to country. Primary school education would mainly consist of the teaching of the core disciplines – the leading disciplines and the subjects devoted to upbringing and character development. They would be implemented by the infusion of basic knowledge in various subjects, knowledge that would be sufficient for mastering the skills and methods needed to understand simple, logically coherent texts under the guidance of teachers and, sometimes, even by pupils themselves. The teaching of leading disciplines would continue throughout all the years of schooling. The content of the intermediate stage as it is taught today consists of these same leading disciplines augmented by specialized subjects, like physics, chemistry, and botany. It is at this stage that I propose introducing the specific topics I described above into the curriculum. Introducing them would, of necessity, be a gradual process, as it would take time for the topics to be created and introduced into the teaching process and for the teachers to be prepared to work differently. Hence, at first there would be more specialized subjects than topics. Over time, however, the topics would gradually supplant today’s disciplines and, if the disciplines continued to exist at all, they would be altered in some ways by the topic-oriented environment. Topics, both because of their inherent characteristics and because of the role they would fill, would simply be more suitable for the intermediate stage and would ultimately occupy the central position in its curriculum.

346

Supplement II

Unlike the intermediate grades, the high schools must, in my opinion, be geared to specialization. By the time pupils enter high school, they should be ready for the branching of secondary education; they should be ready to enter one of the existing school tracks, in which they would study specific material of a humanitarian, technical, or mathematical nature. The reasons for the branching are two-fold: on the one hand, the age of the students already allows them to choose what really attracts them, and, on the other hand, no school plan can include all the scientific materials available at their current high levels, even in a very concise form. Thus, at this stage we can only give pupils specialized courses more or less in accordance with the tracks they choose. After the students’ choices are made, each high school would have to build its curriculum accordingly. The curriculum at this level would consist of leading disciplines, adapted to the directions the pupils have chosen, and some specialized disciplines of the type that are already taught today. Some recommendations for the implementation of my plan At this point, I would like to discuss how I propose to implement the innovations I wrote about above. This aspect of the proposal is no less important than the innovations themselves, as I want my project to be put into motion and not to just remain on paper. I also do not want my suggestions to be introduced by force, as a decree from above; I have lived through too many revolutions to initiate another one. The changes should be naturally and smoothly incorporated into today’s educational practice, as I will explain briefly in this section. Before I begin, I must add one extra note: the discussion in this section relates predominantly to the intermediate level of schooling. To be sure, the extensive changes that would be made at that level would influence the other stages of educa-

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

347

tion, but a detailed discussion of these repercussions seems superfluous at the moment. The chief reforms would be implemented in the curriculum of the middle grades, so I will dwell on these at length. In essence, the gist of my suggestions concerns how best to go about introducing topics into the middle grades of schools, and how to ensure that the current school disciplines and the proposed topics coexist amicably. To begin, I propose that the topics I delineated above (or any other set of topics that are chosen) be prepared in electronic form. An office should be set up that would be responsible for collecting and storing the materials related to each topic. This office, which I call the center of distant education, would be part of the ministry of education of the country in which the plan is implemented. The office would locate appropriate specialists for writing scenarios of the topics. These scenarios should be methodically organized and have a very specific designated audience (for example: “history of money for the fifth grade” or “national alphabet for sixth-graders”). After they are prepared, the topics would be made available in an electronic format and presented to the ministry of education for evaluation. If they were approved for use in the relevant grade, the ministry would announce that they are available and recommend them for introduction into all the suitable educational institutions in the country. Nonetheless, there would be no requirement that every class work with every recommended topic; every teacher would have the right to choose which ones, if any, to use in his or her courses. Moreover, this decision could even be left up to the pupils themselves. This brings me to the most sensitive point of my proposals. I believe that, regardless of whether my plan is implemented or not, a global revision of school education is about to take place. School education will soon be reorganized to incorpo-

348

Supplement II

rate self-education into the structure of formal education. The present state of communications technology and infrastructure is such that we can already start to combine formal schooling with self-education by our pupils. Most pupils already have their own computers and are using them for internet explorations. But they do this instinctively, without knowing exactly what is necessary for their intellectual growth. We (educationalists) would have to guide them in their blind incursions into the ocean of information collected on the internet, and, conversely, we would also have to prevent them from gleaning harmful information from it. This is why I propose using the topics I invented to officially identify and certify material that is appropriate for incorporation into school activities. In light of what I just said, I propose allowing pupils of the intermediate level to work independently on topics that are approved by the educational authorities, to master them, and even to be tested on them and get formal school credit for them. The tests could be administered in the schools and then sent to the center of distant education for evaluation. The marks could then be entered into the matriculation documents of the pupils. In this way, towards the end of the intermediate school level, before they enter high school, pupils would be able to accumulate a lot of additional grades along with the standard evaluations that are now given at schools. Not only would this independent work help infuse students with the skills and habits of self education, the additional grades would give us a comprehensive picture of each individual’s educational activities during the entire intermediate period of their schooling. This could help us to see whether a student is eager to study at all; whether he or she is very determined, or simply swims passively in the educational current; what each student’s learning preferences are and, consequently, what specializations would be appropriate for him or her in high school.

Introducing the General Theory into Branch Semiotics

349

All of these points are of great significance for the further advancement of secondary education. Nonetheless, the main advantage of my proposed plan is that it could greatly enhance pupils’ motivation to take part in educational activities. It would give them the chance to choose to learn what most appeals to them, to do it in their own way, and to get rewards for it in the form of additional credits for their efforts. In this way, we could also solve the most acute educational problems of our time: the problem of how to enable pupils to quickly acquire the learning skills that match their own preferences and inclinations, and the problem of school curriculum overloading. Our pupils themselves would decide whether to study additional material in the form of non-obligatory topics, and this would go a long way towards solving both problems. To achieve these ends, the centers of distant education would have to do a lot of preparatory work. They would have to prepare many different educational topics that are diverse in content and geared to various types of schools and levels. They would have to get approval for them from the ministry of education, receive its support for implementing them, and get its permission to disseminate them to schools. They would also have to compose tests for each topic and set criteria for marking these tests. Finally, they would have to publicize information about which topics are available and explain how they can be accessed and used. This is a project that would take many years to set up and bring to fruition. Still, in the long run the resulting topics would be of practical use, either for independent work by pupils or for teachers to utilize in a classroom setting. As the catalogue of available topics grows, related topics could be collected to create complete disciplines, or incorporated into subjects that are already being taught in the schools. In the distant future, we can imagine the standard school curriculum would include both kinds of teaching materials – disciplines

350

Supplement II

and topics. But this is just conjecture, far distant from the initial step of creating centers for distant education, which is what I suggest be done in many countries as soon as possible.

SUPPLEMENT III VOCABULARY OF SEMIOTIC TERMS

This vocabulary comprises only those terms that were used in my works on semiotics. It aims to incorporate the terms within a single, complete framework that includes concise definitions of their main characteristics. The definitions of some terms have evolved over time, so the definitions here may differ to some extent from those that appear in other works I have written (In addition, in other works they may differ from one another slightly, as well.) The definitions given here are the closest to my current usage. The vocabulary presented here contains 135 items (which translates into more than 150 terms, as some of the items contain multiple terms). It is constantly growing, as I continue to flesh out my theory. Conventions The following conventions are followed in this vocabulary: 1. The terms are arranged in alphabetical order. 2. Each term is highlighted in bold at the beginning of its entry. 3. Within its entry, if the term reappears, it is usually italicized. 4. Alternative definitions of the same term are numbered within the entry. 5. Synonyms and elaborations of a term are placed in parentheses immediately following the highlighted term.

352

Supplement III

6. Terms that are defined elsewhere in the dictionary are underlined. Exceptions are the terms “sign” and “signsystem,” which are repeated so frequently that it is awkward to mark them every time they appear.

A Absence of signs as a sign – a situation in which people understand that something is missing, and the absence of that thing gives them some message or motivates them to perform certain actions, just as the presence of a sign would normally do. Thus, a blank space of a particular size within a text is understood as a break between words, while smaller blank spaces are seen as breaks between letters. Another example of this phenomenon is an agreement between two people that they will meet in a specified apartment, but only if flowers are on the sill of the apartment window (and can be seen from the street). In this case, the absence of flowers on the windowsill is a sign that is understood by the parties involved to mean that they should not enter the apartment. Abstractness of signs – one of the main characteristics of signs, which enables them to represent increasingly significant traits of the objects they denote. Over the course of human history, both individual signs and complete sign-systems have developed in the direction of increasing abstractness. This process has been paralleled by the development of human intellectual resources, both within each human being and in humanity as a whole. Consequently, we are constantly processing more abstract signs and discovering new and deeply concealed mechanisms that exist in natural and social phenomena.

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

353

Aggregate state of a sign-system describes the strength of the “glue” that bonds the various signs in the system together. Bonds between signs may be very weak, as in a simple collection of signs of the same degree of abstraction, in which the signs are not dependent on one another. Examples of signsystems that have weak aggregate states are a “Who’s Who” list and a telephone directory. These are systems in which any number of unrelated items can be placed. Intermediate aggregate states characterize more coherent systems, in which the members show a greater degree of interconnection and interdependence. I call these search-systems. For example, the Dewey decimal system for classifying publications is a search-system that has an intermediate aggregate state. The highest aggregate state is associated with the most coherent sign-systems, like languages, mathematics, and other formalized codes. Algorithm (semiotic) – a method for manipulating the signs of related referents by processing them in accordance with the rules of the sign-system to which they belong. Algorithms usually deal with signs in one of the following ways: syntagmatically – arranging the signs in an order that meets the syntactical requirements of the sign-system, or paradigmatically – changing the initial form and meaning of the signs. Each distinct group of signs in a system has its own algorithm, and the collection of all the algorithms in a system comprises its topography. (See also step in a semiotic algorithm.) Allegory – the symbolic content of a sign, as compared with its denotational content. For instance, in some cases, a picture of scales designates “justice,” or “impartial judgment.” In these cases, the sign has an allegorical meaning – justice – as well as denotational content – the scales.

354

Supplement III

Antonyms – two or more signs that are opposite in their meanings. Antonyms are sometimes indicated by metalinguistic designations, such as opp., ant., or ļ. A pair of antonyms may consist of two contrasting signs, such as the words “difficult” and “easy,” or the mathematical signs “+” and “–”. In some cases, a pair of expressions or gestures can also be antonyms. For example, a nod can mean, “you may enter the room,” whereas a shake of the head can be its antonym, meaning “you may not enter the room.” See also synonyms and homonyms. Audience – all of the interpreters of a sign. Signs are so important for humanity that their dissemination and uniform understanding are sometimes coerced through programs that are specially organized by society, typically in schools or other forms of courses (such as drivers’ education for people wishing to attain drivers’ licenses). This type of audience is called a captive audience. There are, of course, also voluntary audiences, consisting of people who choose of their own accord to learn about signs they consider important. B Basic signs – the main signs in a sign-system, which determine its type and the logic used for processing signs in the system (see logic of processing a sign-system). Although a single sign-system frequently contains signs with varying degrees of abstraction, the basic signs of a sign-system must all have the same degree of abstraction. Thus, the traffic regulation system uses various types of signs – images, geometric figures, and words – but its basic signs are images. Hence, it is an iconic sign-system and its main processing logic is transductive – each sign is dealt with separately when it is encountered. In notations, the basic sign is a grapheme, in mathematical codes, it is a symbol.

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

355

The introduction of the concept of basic signs enables us to build a hierarchy of the signs in a system, from those of its signs that are simpler than its basic signs to those that are more complex. In languages, for example, words are the basic signs, but there are also simpler signs – morphemes, phonemes, etc. – that are below words in the hierarchy, and more complex signs – syntagmas, sentences, and paragraphs – that are above words. All of these signs are derivatives of words, though they themselves may be the basic signs of secondary linguistic systems. For instance, phonemes are the basic signs of phonetic transcriptions. Basic signs usually exist in combination with other types of signs. Three varieties of such combinations exist: 1. The set of basic signs only contains nomenclature signs, like the basic signs of the Periodic table of chemical elements, which only includes the symbols of all the known elements. 2. The set of basic signs primarily consists of merged signs, like physical charts in cartography. 3. The set of basic signs includes both conjoined nomenclature signs and merged signs, as in phonetic transcriptions. Betwixt and between signs – a category of signs whose quantum of abstraction is between that of variable signs and that of signs with denotational value. During sign transformations, variables are usually replaced by betwixt and between signs. Later, when the results of the transformations are applied to the concrete world, these signs are replaced by denotational signs. For example, formulas in physics initially include variables. Then betwixt and between signs replace variables, and later they are themselves replaced with signs that have specific practical implications. This three-stage transformation can be divided into two separate dual-stage

356

Supplement III

transformations: transforming variables into betwixt and between signs and storing the results for future applications, or transforming betwixt and between signs into denotational signs that are applicable in life. The term betwixt and between signs may sometimes have another meaning; it may refer to signs that stand between the basic signs of the system. In this case, they are also called intermediate signs. Thus, minutes may serve as betwixt and between signs, if hours are accepted as basic signs for time designation. If days are fixed as basic signs for calendars, hours become their betwixt and between signs in system paradigms. Branch semiotics – the study and use of signs as part of the corpus of data collected within a specific scientific branch. In branch semiotics, the signs that are developed within a particular science are dealt with in accordance with the conceptual formulations and values of that science. In general semiotics, these same signs are handled differently, because they are analyzed within the context and conceptual framework of semiotics as a separate branch of science in and of itself. C Chaotically created sign-system – a sign-system that comes into existence spontaneously, without any predefined plan. People who work with and organize such systems constantly modify and restructure them in an effort to make them more systematic. To do this, they invent metalanguages for the systems. The metalanguages are used to establish order within the sign-systems, a process that gradually reduces the entropy of the systems. This process is exemplified, for example, in natural languages, for which metalanguages (grammars and dictionaries) are continually being invented and employed.

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

357

Closed sign-system – a sign-system to which additional signs cannot be added. There are two types of closed sign-systems: 1. Systems whose signs are arranged in a fixed order, like alphabets 2. Systems whose signs are not in any particular order, like a list of participants in a sporting event. A list of this sort has a finite number of members, but it may be rearranged in any way and for any particular purpose. For example, it can be arranged by the days on which participants compete or by the sports in which they take part. Code (semiotic code) can have any of the following meanings: 1. A textual code – a sign-system that can be used by other sign-systems, like a language, mathematics, or logical notation. 2. The highest type of sign-system in the semiotic hierarchy: mathematics or some other formalized code. 3. A collection of symbols. This meaning can be seen as borrowed from the original meaning of the term code, and is essentially non-technical in nature. An example of this usage can be found in the popular book, The Da Vinci Code, by Dan Brown. 4. A secret, cryptographic system of signs whose purpose is to hide confidential information. This type of signsystem is unusual; most sign-systems are intended to be as clear and decipherable as possible, but this type is not. Code of unusual motivation – a secret cryptographic code that is used to cipher confidential information (see also code, definition 4).

358

Supplement III

Collection-system (collection) – the type of sign-system that has the lowest aggregate state. A collection is an assemblage of signs that meet some particular criteria. All the signs in a collection have a similar degree of abstraction. In addition, a collection-system is always open-ended; signs can be added to the collection or removed from it as required. An example of a collection-system is an assemblage of all of the first names that are used in a particular community. Note: The type of sign-system that has the next higher level of system coherence, above collection-systems, is the search-system. Composite construction of a semiotic field – a type of construction in which the signs in a field are manipulated using a collection of semiotic algorithms that treat various groups of signs in the field separately, using distinct techniques. For example, a language has a composite construction because it handles different parts of speech differently, even though they belong to the same semiotic field (definition 1). A semiotic field that has a composite construction is created by using a global syntactic configuration as a template for the sign-system and populating the sign-system with specific signs that meet the requirements of the template. The result is a single semiotic field (definition 2) that has defined rules and boundaries. For example, a written text is a sign-system that contains specific letters, words, sentences and paragraphs. The global syntactic configuration of the text defines how these elements can be placed in the text, how the boundaries between these elements must be inserted (empty spaces of various sizes between certain elements), and how the boundaries of the entire text must be identified (additional empty spaces).

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

359

Compound sign (compound) – a sign that is produced by combining two or more simple signs. Thus, 16O (an oxygen isotope) is formed from two simple signs; similarly, a musical note with a dot beside it (indicating that the sound should be prolonged) is a compound of two signs. In some cases, a morphological addition is also inserted into the compound, as with a musical note followed by a dot and a crotchet or an arco. Compound signs should not be confused with semiotic syntagmas – strings of signs that constitute meaningful pieces of text. See also, derivative sign. Compounds tend to turn into idiomatic complexes. In this case, their parts are so closely linked that they become inseparable and are not even identified with their primary meanings. Examples of the latter are idioms in languages and formulas in algebra or physics. In this way, they produce merged signs. Concept – a type of word that does not only denote something in ontological or semiotic reality, but also molds discourse within a science or practical activity. Concepts accompany the formation of scientific language in every developed branch of science. They are defined differently from mere notions, in that they employ more extensive terminology and more rigorous logical procedures. Concurrent sign-systems are multiple sign-systems that can use one another’s texts. By contrast, non-concurrent systems require a translator for understanding and further processing of borrowed texts. See also inertial frames of reference. Connotation – an additional feature of a sign that is reflected primarily in its denotation. For example, if smoke is the denotation of a sign that signifies a fire, the color of the smoke is a connotation of the smoke that may indicate the

360

Supplement III

type of material that is burning in the fire. Similarly, the specific qualities of the smell of the smoke are connotations that may convey additional information to those who recognize them. Connotations are the simplest syntactic ties of signs that are derived from ontology (as compared with signs that rely more on the human mind). Conventionality in signs – a reference to the fact that some signs are connected to their referents by convention rather than by a resemblance to concrete objects or situations. That is, while some signs look like the objects or situations they denote, others, like symbolic gestures, or the sound of a gong used in theatrical productions to indicate that the show is about to start, are only connected with their referents by convention. The degree of conventionality varies from sign to sign, and many conventional signs are specific to particular cultures. Cursive form of a sign – a form of a sign that is used to make it simpler and quicker to reproduce. More often than not, the cursive form is less complicated than the formal image of a sign. In addition, it is usually linked in some way with other cursive signs. A cursive form may depend upon the intuition of the user (like a clock face without numbers) or may be systematically learned by users (like cursive letters in writing). It may even be used as a teaching aid, like contour maps in geography, which do not represent all of the features of the region they represent, because they only focus on particular types of details. D Degree of abstraction (quantum of abstraction):

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

361

1. Of signs – the extent to which a sign is detached from its referent; the farther a sign is from its referent, the more abstract it is. Thus, natural signs, which are parts of the things they signify, are the least abstract signs. The degree of abstraction is greater in images, and increases further with words, graphemes and symbols (in this order). Special characteristics of signs and their systems are revealed by their degrees of abstraction. 2. Of sign-systems – the extent to which a sign-system is abstract. This is a function both of the degree of abstraction of the signs that form the sign-system and of certain features of the system itself, like its logic of processing. Delayed verification – verification of sign-system manipulations that takes place after the process of manipulation is completed. The verification period may extend for days, months, or even years, especially when highly abstract systems are involved. For example, delayed verification is a common feature in cosmological investigations or mathematical theories. Delayed verification stands in contrast to step-bystep or immediate verification of sign-system manipulations. Denotation – that which is designated by a sign. For example, the denotation of a series of foot or paw prints could be a trail. The additional characteristics of this sign are its connotations – whether the trail is fresh or old, was made by an adult or a child, etc. The denotation of a sign, combined with its connotational components and its syntactical ties, are the three components that compose every sign. However, the proportions of each of the three components vary from sign to sign (see denotational part of a sign).

362

Supplement III

Denotational part of a sign – Each sign consists of two main elements: denotational and syntactic (sometimes, syntax is replaced by connotation – see denotation). The denotational element designates something outside of the system – the sign’s referent; the syntactic element describes the sign’s established or potential bonds with other signs or with the global system configuration. Sign processing brings about changes in the denotational aspects of signs in accordance with their syntactic characteristics. Denotational sign – see out-of-system sign. Derivative sign (derivative) – a sign that is usually produced from one or more simple signs combined with something additional (like affixes, letters, or diacritics). There are two types of derivatives: morphologic derivatives and compounds. Morphologic derivatives are built by adding a morphologic component to a simple sign: “chair” + “s” = “chairs” (see also, morphologic paradigm). Compounds are built by combining two simple signs: “chair” + “arm” = “armchair.” Compounds may also have morphologic components added to them: “many” + “fold” + “ed” = “manifolded.” E Empty syntactic spot (empty space): 1. A blank space that is intentionally left in a semiotic text in order to be filled by another sign of a lesser degree of abstraction. Examples include the empty squares in a crossword puzzle that are to be filled with letters, and empty places on a clock face that will be filled with the appropriate numerals and marks. These empty spots have the highest level of abstraction, and provide the

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

363

framework for the process of release from excessive abstractness in a semiotic text. 2. A blank space that is used to define the boundaries of a sign or a semiotic configuration; especially, blank spaces that are left between the other signs of a written text, such as its words, sentences, or paragraphs. Entropy – the degree of chaos and disorder in a system. Unlike ontological systems (biological, physical, etc.), signsystems, which are created and improved by people, always gravitate towards reductions of their levels of entropy. F Formalized code – see mathematical sign-system. Form of a sign – the exact appearance of a sign. A single sign may have many forms that resemble each other but have slight differences. For example, in a single writing system, the appearance of individual letters may vary, as they do in the various fonts that belong to the system of notation recognized by computers. Diverse forms of a single sign sometimes develop into significant sign variations. This occurs, for example, with capital letters, which can have qualities that are quite different from those of their lower-case forms. Formula – in mathematics, a strictly defined, inseparable semiotic paradigm for working with a group of related signs. In semiotic argot, formulas are called idiomatic complexes. Fragment of a semiotic field – an element of a semiotic field, like one of the squares on a checker board or the regions that are defined by the intersections of meridians and parallels in geographic charts. The set of all of the fragments of a semi-

364

Supplement III

otic field fully fill the whole semiotic field. Note that disparate semiotic models of the same designated object may result in distinctive fragmentation, and, as a result, individual fragments may differ not only in form, but in essence. For example, geographic charts and globes represent the same object (the planet earth), but their fragments are quite different from one another. This leads to variations in the signs they contain and the forms of these signs; for example, the outlines of continents and islands have distinct forms. In addition to denotational signs, fragments can also contain functional and syntactic signs. (See also, links and orientation signs.) Functional sign (systemic sign) – a sign that is used to process other signs, the latter of which denote things in ontological or semiotic reality. Two kinds of functional signs exist: syntactic signs and logical signs. See also systemic sign. G General semiotics – a branch of science that studies signs and their systems within its own conceptual framework. General semiotics stands in contrast to branch semiotics, which looks at each sign-system from the point of view of the branch of science that makes direct use of it. Global syntactic configuration – a general characterization of a particular semiotic field. For example, written texts, drawings, and traffic lights all have global syntactic configurations that are based on their syntactic designs. There are internationally accepted global syntactic configurations that give rise to multiple sign-systems – like the axis of coordinates that underlies circles, columns, and lines. There are also national (or sub-national) global syntactic configurations, like the rules for composing a written text in a specific language, or a national alphabet.

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

365

The set of longitudes and latitudes used in cartography is another example of a global syntactic configuration. This configuration comprises many rectangular sections in which different denotational signs can be placed. Without a grid of this sort, we could not place geographic signs in their proper places so that they can accurately reflect their actual arrangement in reality. I call components like these rectangular sections syntactic fragments. Grapheme – Any basic sign in a notation sign-system. The forms of graphemes are quite whimsical and arbitrary: dots and dashes in Morse code, notes in musical notation, flag signals, etc. Group of signs (sign group) – a subset of the signs within a system that are processed according to similar rules. For example, ones, tens, hundreds, etc. are groups within the system of natural numbers; they belong to the same system and are represented by the same figures, but they are handled differently and should be learned separately. Similarly, the chemical elements presented in the periodic table are divided into groups, each of whose members are handled by means of different or similar rules and procedures. An assemblage of all of the groups in a system constitutes the topography of the semiotic field represented by the system. See also algorithm. H Homonyms (homonymous signs) – two or more signs that are similar in form, but different in meaning. For example, a “>“ symbol serves as a “greater-than” sign in mathematical systems, but it may serve as a sign of direction in another system. Homonymous signs may also belong to a single system, like homonyms in a language.

366

Supplement III

I Iconic sign-system – a sign-system that uses images as its basic signs. In the ontogenesis and phylogenesis of human development, iconic sign-systems follow natural sign-systems and are followed by languages. Most cultural phenomena, such as drawing and theatrical productions, belong to this kind of system. Idiomatic complex (idiom) – the result and final stage of sign merging (see also merged signs). The intermediate stage, where we can distinguish the parts of the idiom and sometimes transform them, is called a compound sign. The elements of an idiom are inseparable and unchangeable, and they are used as if they were a single simple sign. Examples of idioms are idiomatic linguistic expressions and mathematical formulas. Image – the basic sign in iconic sign-systems. Images are isomorphic with their referents. This isomorphism may be expressed as a patent resemblance between the sign and its referent, or it may be a matter of convention (see conventionality in signs), as when people agree that the figure of a lion in a coat-of-arms means “strength” and “influence.” Immediate verification (step-by-step verification) – verification of sign-system manipulations that takes place during the process of manipulation. Not all sign-systems are subject to immediate verification, but some systems with relatively low abstraction levels invite and even demand it. For example, when painting a portrait or a landscape, artists often divert their eyes from the pictures they are painting in order to compare them with the objects they represent and thus verify their accuracy. In mathematics, by contrast, the process of manipulation is bound by the rules of transformation, and ver-

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

367

ification in terms of its consistency with the real world can be undertaken only after a final result has been achieved. See also, delayed verification. Inertial frames of reference – concurrent sign-systems that are used for spatial relations and motion. In order for multiple sign-systems of this type to belong to the same inertial group, they must share the same orientation towards the objects they describe (the earth or other celestial bodies) and/or the same frame of reference (observation point). Each sign-system in the group can use different types of charts, as long as they share the same orientation and frame of reference. Non-inertial frames of reference are non-concurrent signsystems in the sense used above; they are also used for spatial relations and motion, but have different points of observation and/or different orientations. For example, one may be oriented towards the sky, while another is oriented towards the earth. A sign-system that is included in an inertial group is not compatible with any sign-system of a non-inertial group. They have different syntactical configurations and different sets of signs. Intermediate sign – a sign that is used to fill semiotic intervals between the basic signs of a system. For example, if you choose hours as basic signs for defining time, minutes and seconds become intermediate signs. But if you choose the whole day as a basic sign, hours become intermediate signs. Basic signs and intermediate signs together compose groups of mixed signs, like the group of ordinary fractions or the groups of decimal fractions.

368

Supplement III

Interpreter – a person who understands something from ontological or semiotic reality as a sign, that is, as something that represents something more than itself. Humans consciously and actively grasp the nature of signs, and even of the absence of signs. By contrast, inanimate objects, plants, and animals can follow or make use of the established order of things around them, but they can only do so unconsciously, by instinct or reflex. Isotopic sign – a sign that denotes one of a group of related referents. Thus, O denotes any type of oxygen, whereas 16 O and 18O are isotopic signs, each of which denotes one of the oxygen isotopes. Sometimes a general denomination is used to refer to all of the members of the group, while isotopic signs are assigned to each specific class of a referent. For example, the word “chair” means “chair in general,” even though such an object does not actually exist. In reality, there are only specific types of “chairs” – “garden chairs,” “stools,” “armchairs,” etc. – and these designations are isotopic signs within the group of chairs. A general denomination like “chair” is called a polysemic sign. L Language system (language, linguistic sign-system) – a system based on words as its basic signs. Examples of language systems are natural and artificial languages, esoteric languages that communicate by means of whistling or drums, sign languages like those used by the deaf, and philosophic languages. Written languages that are composed of notation signs (graphemes) belong to another type of sign-system, namely notations. Linear construction of a sign-system – organization of the signs in a sign-system as a simple ordered list, one after

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

369

the other. The alphabet, for example, is built linearly from the beginning to the end. By contrast, the periodic system of chemical elements is not linear; the signs in the system are divided into groups, represented by rows, and certain qualities are repeated in each row (see periodic construction of signsystems). Similarly, cosmology does not use a linear system; rather, the system comprises celestial objects of various types, and each type of sign is handled using a different algorithm. In fact, the construction of the semiotic field of cosmology is neither linear nor periodic, but composite. Linear processing of a sign-system – the process of converting a string of signs into a coherent and logically structured sequence, as in the synthesis of a text from an assemblage of phrases. Whereas thoughts may be formed synchronously, their sign reflection – their expression by means of speech, a mathematical equation, or the like – is always sequential and sometimes linear. Links (link-signs) – signs that are used to connect other signs. Links can be divided into two categories: those that connect other signs together within a single sign-system, and those that are used to refer to signs from different texts or even from various sign-systems. The first category of links includes dashes, equals signs, and other signs with similar meanings. It also includes arrows that indicate where we should go in order to continue with the activity we are currently involved in, and punctuation marks that show that a narrative has a continuation. The second kind of link either identifies the source of a citation or adds an explanation for something written in the corpus in which the link appears. With the development of communication via computers, additional kinds of links have become available. In addition to conventional footnotes and

370

Supplement III

endnotes, links that can take us directly to other sources of knowledge, like related web pages, now exist. Logic of processing a sign-system – the type of reasoning people employ in order to make use of a sign-system. I have identified the following four types of logic that are used in the processing of sign-systems. All four types are inherent to the process of using any type of sign-system. 1. Matching logic: Identifying the correspondence between the real situation and the sign-system. For example, imagine you are driving in an unknown locality. To find your way, you make use of both road signs and your external surroundings. By matching the two, you deduce the information you need in order to proceed towards your destination. 2. Formal logic: Applying the standard principles of reasoning. This type of logic is employed in all human actions, in both ontological and semiotic reality. 3. Sign-system logic: Applying the internal rules of the sign-system. For example, imagine that you are driving and you arrive at a traffic circle. To proceed into the circle safely, you need neither road signs nor formal logic; all you need is to know the traffic rule that gives the right of way to vehicles that are already in the circle. 4. Application logic: Interpreting unfamiliar signs. For example, imagine that you are driving along a familiar road and come upon an obstruction of some kind, such as a large pothole, with unfamiliar signs around it. To deal with this situation, you must quickly interpret the signs and apply them to the situation.

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

371

Logical sign – a functional sign that helps build a coherent, logical text. Examples of logical signs are the word pairs “if…then” and “either…or” that may be used in natural languages or in computer programming. Special symbols with the same meanings may also be used in certain contexts. M Main sign-system – the primary sign-system in a grouping of all of the systems that serve a single purpose. For example, natural languages serve as the main means of communication among people; they are the main sign-systems among a variety of systems that help languages carry out this task (grammars, dictionaries, phonetic transcriptions, and many other secondary sign-systems). Mathematical sign-system (mathematics, formalized code) – a sign-system based on symbols as its basic signs. Symbols have the highest degree of abstraction among all signs, a feature that engenders distinctive characteristics in mathematical sign-systems. Rather than dealing with ontological phenomena directly, mathematical systems usually deal with mental mathematical interpretations of these phenomena. Two types of mathematical sign-systems exist: 1. Mathematical sign-systems that use signs with fixed referents, like those used in physical or chemical formulas or in arithmetic with nominal numbers 2. Mathematical sign-system that support the use of variables, like those used in algebra or in syllogisms, in which letters serve as variables. These are sign-systems of the highest degree of abstractness (much higher than systems whose signs have fixed referents). In these systems, syntactical components practically replace the

372

Supplement III

denotational parts of signs, so that the signs only retain syntactical elements. Meaning of a sign – what the sign denotes in ontological or semiotic reality. The meanings of signs comprise not only the designations of their referents (denotations), but also their connotations and syntactical ties. Merged signs – a state reached by some compound signs, in which they become solid and inseparable (see also idiomatic complexes). To achieve this state, the compound must first go through a few preliminary stages of development. The process begins when two or more isolated signs are linked together, with or without a diacritic of some kind connecting them together. Then, use of the compound becomes habitual and gradually takes on the status of a norm. Finally, over a lengthy period of time, the compound becomes so well established that it becomes part of the stock of basic signs in the system. At that point, it achieves the status of a merged sign. Compound words in languages (e.g., “icebreaker” and “breakthrough”), and algebraic formulas, are common examples of merged signs. Metalanguage of a sign-system – a set of rules for processing the signs contained in a sign-system. The metalanguage of a system also includes an enumeration of all of the signs in the system, their hierarchic relationships, and their composite parts. The set of rules includes procedures for forming compounds and algorithms for processing them within the framework of the system. Mixed sign – a sign that is composed of basic signs and intermediate signs that belong to the same sign-system. Examples of mixed signs are mixed fractions (ordinary ratios or

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

373

decimals), and musical notes with a sharp, a flat, or a natural symbol. Model (semiotic model) – a representation of an ontological or semiotic phenomenon that illustrates its primary characteristics and the connections between these characteristics. Examples are a model of an atom, of the solar system, and of a benzyl molecule. Note that semiotic models differ from material models, which attempt to accurately portray in miniature form how things, like a particular object in ontology, look and act. Semiotic models can be primary, in which case they only give a fragmental mental representation of the object or occurrence they represent. Thus, the model of an atom that was proposed by Rutherford in 1911, was very sketchy and approximate, but it sparked further investigations. This research led to more and more detailed models of atomic structure, until the currently agreed upon and final model (for the time being) was created. Model of a sign – The following three types of sign models exist: 1. A model of a sign as it interacts with its referent, on the one hand, and as it is represented in our minds (an idea), on the other. Usually, a triangle is used for this type of model. 2. A model of a sign in a sign-system, presenting its interaction with the system in which it is included. 3. A model of a sign (and of its sign-system) as it is incorporated into the body of human knowledge. Monosemic sign – a sign that refers to a unique object or idea, like a proper noun in a language. Monosemic signs stand in contrast to polysemic signs.

374

Supplement III

Morphologic paradigm – a construct that comprises all the different morphologic forms of a single sign. In languages, morphologic paradigms are well-known. The words “table,” “a table,” “the table,” “tables,” and “table’s” constitute such a paradigm. The sign that gives rise to all the other forms (“table”) is called the basic sign. All the other forms are called derivatives. Morphologic paradigms can also be constructed for chemical isotopes and many other types of signs. Morphologic level of syntax – the level of syntax that defines all the basic signs of the system and endows them with the qualities that determine their potential for establishing ties with other signs (see morphologic paradigm). This is the first level of syntax in sign-systems; the other levels are the syntagmatic, sentence, and textual levels. N Natural sign-system – a sign-system that is built on natural signs. Orientation by the stars and diagnosis of illness by means of visible symptoms, are examples of natural signsystems. Natural sign – a sign that consists of a part of an observed phenomenon. The observer (interpreter) uses the part to reconstruct the whole. For example, smoke is a natural sign that indicates the presence of a fire, and the polar star is a natural sign that indicates which direction is north. Natural signs tell us about things that we cannot fully perceive directly. Nomenclature (nomenclature signs) – the simplest kind of signs, which denote the most basic ontological elements in their semiotic manifestations. For colors, these are the seven basic colors and white. For music, they are the seven notes of an octave. For chemistry, they are the names of all the known

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

375

elements. All derivatives – compounds and merged signs – are produced from these signs. When a compound sign becomes established in the system as a merged sign, it is added to the nomenclatures as a basic sign of that semiotic system. Notation – a sign-system that is built on graphemes as its basic signs. In many notations, the forms of the signs are chosen at random. The most common example of a notation signsystem is alphabetic writing, in which the letters are graphemes – arbitrary characters that represent the various sounds of the language. Other notations that are based on arbitrarily chosen graphemes are musical notations and cartographic signs. Notion: 1. A construct in our minds that represents something from ontological or semiotic reality. Although signs denote such things, they are always transfigured in our minds, so that our mental notions differ to some extent from the signs themselves. This meaning of the term “notion” is often conveyed by the word “idea”. 2. A type of word that denotes multiple things of a particular kind. In this sense, notions differ, on the one hand, from proper names, and, on the other hand, from concepts. Proper names only designate individual things. Concepts, like notions, are used for designating classes of objects, but unlike notions, they also organize scientific discourse in particular branches of knowledge or practical activities. In essence, concepts are a special kind of notion.

376

Supplement III

O Ontological reality – the external world as it exists around us and within our own bodies. We can change ontological reality, but we do not bring it into being and cannot remake it completely to our liking. Ontological reality stands in contrast to semiotic reality, which is entirely a product of our conscious minds. Open sign-system – a sign-system that is specially constructed to be open-ended, so that it has the potential to incorporate as many new signs as necessary. Examples of open sign-systems are the string of natural numbers and a telephone directory. Open sign-systems stand in contrast to closed signsystems. Operational sign-system – a sign-system that relies more on a concrete ontological situation than on our mental images of things. Examples can be found on product labels and on signs that help people orient themselves on roads, in shops, and in offices. Operational sign-systems are inseparable from their ontological surroundings, and it is these surroundings that determine their practical value and meaning. For this reason, they are not included in our sign classification. Orientation mark – a sign that indicates how to use a particular sign-system. A wind rose and a scale indicator on a map are signs of this kind. Other examples are the key symbols and time signatures in musical scores. Metalanguage insertions, like a legend on a chart, or the title of a drawing, are also kinds of orientation marks. Out-of-system sign (denotational sign) – a sign that denotes something outside of the sign-system. Out-of-system

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

377

signs can be processed within the system using syntactic signs. Overlapping of sign-systems – A situation in which a more abstract sign-system in a particular field of endeavor developed before a less abstract sign-system with a similar purpose. The more common situation is that sign-systems develop in sequence, gradually progressing from less-abstract systems to more-abstract systems. However, overlapping sign-systems do exist. One example concerns earth cartography: its characteristic kind of conventional images was developed earlier than the simpler images that serve as the basic signs of navigational cartography. However, both of these systems are part of cartography and both belong to the same type of sign-system – the fourth level of our hierarchy, notations – so the “overlap” is not very extensive. The overlap occurred because people delegated the job of “seeing” extensive areas of the earth – larger regions than we ourselves can observe at one time – to machines. In situations like this, machines repeat the human experience by passing through the same stages of sign usage (beginning with natural and iconic signs, and proceeding later on to the more abstract stages). P Paradigm – see semiotic paradigm. Particular semiotics – see branch semiotics. Periodic construction of a sign-system – organization of the signs in a sign-system by dividing them into groups that reflect periodic variations in the properties of their referents. Periodic construction emphasizes the way the referents of certain signs have similar properties, making it possible to select the semiotic paradigm that is appropriate for each par-

378

Supplement III

ticular periodic group of signs. The best known system of this kind is the periodic table of chemical elements that was developed by Mendeleev. Circular systems like a clock face or certain types of calendars are additional examples of periodic constructions. It is worthwhile to note that there are also individual signs with elements that return periodically, like repeating decimals in mathematics. Polysemic sign – a sign that can refer to any of a variety of objects of the same kind (e.g., the word “chair” when it represents any single chair in the world) or to any number of subgroups of the same general category (e.g., the word “chair” when it represents different kinds of chairs: “armchair,” “Chippendale,” “nursery chair,” etc.). The subgroups of a polysemic sign are termed isotopic signs with reference to their common general name. They themselves constitute polysemic signs with reference to the individual objects that belong to their groups. For example, “armchair” is a polysemic sign with reference to each specific armchair in the world, and an isotopic sign with reference to the polysemic sign “chair.” Polysemic signs stand in contrast to monosemic signs. Potential signs – Signs are sometimes presented within an expansive whole – a geographic map, for example. They are found there in their potential state and have to be activated in order to serve as full-fledged semiotic entities for practical use. Another common example of this phenomenon is the user interface of a computer program. Users of the program choose, from among many potential signs, those signs they will employ in the current operation. Depending on the operation they choose to perform, different potential signs are singled out and processed.

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

379

Primary semiotic models – sketchy and approximate representations of an object or topic under study. Primary semiotic models often only portray the relationships of the designated substance separately for each of its known interactions. Over time, primary semiotic models tend to expand into better-substantiated depictions, which in the long run come to be accepted by the scientific community. Material models of the object under investigation and its practical applications are usually built on these expanded models. R Recharging of a sign – transplantation of a sign from one position in a sign-system to another, usually more important, position, in which it has a greater weight in the system. For example, in arithmetic, moving numerals to higher positions – e.g., from tens to hundreds, or hundreds to thousands – in order to denote larger numbers, is a way of recharging those numerals. In some cases, as in this example, recharged signs remain just as they were, but with different weights. In other cases, recharged signs are replaced by other signs. This is the case, for example, in chess, when a pawn that reaches the last row of the board is converted into a different piece. What is important in all of these cases is that the sign acquires a new content and weight in the system; it is this process that is called recharging. Rules for recharging must be defined in the metalanguage of the system before the process can take place. Redeployment of signs has at least two variant meanings: 1. Replacing signs with synonymic signs of the same level of abstractness that are appropriate for different ontological circumstances. Thus, when we measure things in our immediate surroundings, we may use the metric system with meters as the base (cm., mm., etc.). On the

380

Supplement III

other hand, when we measure cosmic distances, we use parsecs, light years, or other units that are appropriate for such vast distances. And nautical units of distance are different from all of these units. But the idea of measuring distances and the application of units are common for all three cases. Only the units (signs) are different; they are redeployed. 2. Copying a word or a component of a text in order to translate or explain it. Sometimes individual components of a compound that was created from a number of simple signs are marked in a text in order to indicate that they are explained elsewhere on the page. A copy of the marked component, such as an enlarged part of a picture or diagram, is then placed elsewhere on the page. This copy of the component is a redeployment of the original sign. Similarly, a text may include notes on particular words, such as translations of difficult words. When the original word is copied into the margin alongside its translation, the copied word is a redeployment of the original word in the text. Another example of this process is when a part of a picture or of a map is zoomed; in this case, the same sign appears, but in a larger size. Referent (signified) – that which is denoted by a semiotic sign. Register – an alternative set of signs that can replace some or all of the standard signs in a particular system. Slang and argot are registers of natural languages. Musical arrangements of the same piece for different instruments are also registers; because they repeat the main traits of their prototypes, musical arrangements are registers rather than secondary signsystem (see also variability of sign-systems).

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

381

Release from excessive abstraction – the process of converting abstract signs into their more tangible counterparts in order to make them useful for a practical application. This procedure occurs with all types of signs, but relatively more abstract signs tend to use it more often and in more sophisticated variations than less abstract signs. In the most abstract sign-systems, it is an integral element of sign processing, and the process of abstraction release is incorporated into the defined procedures of their metalanguages. Thus, for example, these procedures are included in the standard rules of symbolic logic, and are included in the training of students of this field. Rigidity – the degree of strictness and formality in the formulation of the meta-rules for processing a sign-system. In some systems, like mathematical codes, the rules are very formal and exact. In others, like painting, they are notably unstructured. Role of a sign – a position and set of behaviors assigned by the rules of the system to each sign within the system. The role of a sign defines how it is related to the other signs in the system and how it can interact with them in particular circumstances. For example, every chess piece has an initial role in the game and a status vis-à-vis the other pieces in each of the various stages of the game (see also weight of a sign). S Search-system – a type of sign-system that has an intermediate aggregate state. Search-systems are more consistent and internally coherent than collection-systems, but their signs have a weaker level of interdependence than those of languages and other highly abstract systems. Examples of

382

Supplement III

search-systems are dictionaries of various types, the Dewey decimal bibliographical classification system, and search systems in computer programs. Secondary sign-system – a sign-system whose purpose is to help process a main sign-system. For example, languages act as main systems, while their grammars, dictionaries, and many other systems of various levels of abstraction, are secondary linguistic systems that help to explain languages and aid in their use. Semiosis – see semiotic activity. Semiotic activity (semiosis) – the creation and use of signs and sign-systems. Semiotic activity may be viewed from two points of view: that of the science of semiotics (see general semiotics), and that of the sciences that make use of its signs and sign-systems (see branch semiotics). In the first case, analysis of semiotic activity is imbued with notions that are specific to the field of semiotics. In the second case, the analysis is part and parcel of the science in which the semiotic activity occurred, and this science is the main judge of the usefulness of the signs and sign-systems being analyzed. Semiotic code – see code. Semiotic congruence – the compatibility of one signsystem with another. Compatible sign-systems can easily be converged one into another; incompatible ones require translation. See also synonyms. Semiotic equalization – one of the principal ways to transform signs in a system, making them less abstract and more patent and comprehensible. This process entails identifying

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

383

the various synonymous forms of signs. In math, this process is made explicit with the sign of equality (=). In other systems, it is not explicit, but it nevertheless exists, and is expressed through explanations, comparisons, synonyms, etc. Semiotic field: 1. The assemblage of all the referents of the signs in a sign-system. The semiotic field also defines the boundaries of the system’s domain. 2. The entire configuration of a particular semiotic text, including its signs, the syntax defining how these signs relate to one another, and the empty spaces that define the boundaries of the text. See also text in semiotics. Semiotic model – see model. Semiotic paradigm – a way of constructing semiotics as a science, one that is distinct from other sciences. This is done in order to ensure that all semioticians work within the same framework of semiotic procedures. It includes the philosophic underpinnings of semiotic investigations, its particular system of axioms, classification of its principal concepts (like signs, sign-systems, semiotic reality, and basic signs), its specific terminology, and all the other parts of any scientific paradigm. Semiotic projection: 1. A semiotic model exemplifying a possible implementation of an elaborate scientific theory. For example, in 1874, Ernst Hekkel built his Tree of Human Evolution, in which he drew all the hypothetical junctions of human development, from the amoeba up to today’s humans, in accordance with Darwin’s theory of evolution. This was a semiotic projection.

384

Supplement III

2. A device for translating ontological phenomena into the realm of semiotics, and vice versa. This type of semiotic projection is similar to the type described in definition 1, but the level of detail is much greater. For example, in order to create technical drawings, we use axonometric projections that help us represent all the necessary parameters of the object that is being designed. Semiotic reality – that which is embodied in signs and sign-systems. It is semiotic reality that is studied by every science that makes use of signs, and it is semiotic reality that is summarized in semiotics by means of its conceptual framework. Semiotic reality is as real as ontological reality; it differs from the latter only in that it was created through the conscious efforts of humans, whereas ontological reality was given to us ready-made. Semiotics – a science of signs, sign-systems, and semiotic reality. In my view, semiotics ought to confine itself to the study of the scientific output of other sciences and other human activities, whenever this output consists of signs and/or sign-systems. The science of general semiotics should give new and additional consideration to this output by analyzing it within its own conceptual framework. I believe that modern semiotics should be divided into four branches, based on their particular conceptual bases: 1. The familiar kind of semiotics, which is based on the signs and sign-systems created and advanced by humans, and to which I relate in my theory of general semiotics 2. The semiotics of plants and animals, which respond to signs by instinct or through primitive forms of the stimulus-response type

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

385

3. The semiotics of signs that were implanted into machines or other inanimate mechanisms by humans 4. The semiotics of situations that have a social character, in which signs not only denote, but also symbolize some ideological value (in politics, religion, and other activities that have significant social aspects) Sentence level of syntax – the level of syntax that follows the morphologic and syntagmatic levels and precedes the textual level. The sentence level of syntax comprises rules for collecting all the syntagmas into a single sentence of a particular type. In languages, these may be declarative sentences, questions, exclamatory sentences, etc.; in chemistry, they would include various types of notations for describing complete reactions; in algebra, they would be cohesive equations; etc. Sign – anything that performs some or all of the following functions: 1. Standing for something else (its referent) 2. Characterizing its referent in some way 3. Representing its referent in semiotic transformations That which a sign represents is called its referent or signified. A sign is most useful if it reflects its referent as completely as possible. However, no sign can ever represent its referent one-hundred percent accurately, because both the referent and modes of representation are constantly changing. Even so, once a sign is attached to a particular referent, it can continue to represent it, even if the referent changes over time. On the other hand, a new sign can also be chosen for it, if the existing sign seems insufficient for the intended purpose.

386

Supplement III

Even the absence of a sign may be a sign, as when the absence of a plant in a window is used to mean “danger for potential visitors.” A sign may be any object or property of the signified, as long as the observer (interpreter) is aware in advance that it will be used as a sign. Signs more often than not are gathered in sign-systems, and it is there that their properties are fully expressed. Sign-bearer – a physical device, or a person’s limbs, organs, or capabilities (like the human voice, for instance), that make it possible for a sign to be realized. Thus, a traffic-light box is a physical sign-bearer for the lights that are the signs of the system. In a written text, paper or some other material may be a sign-bearer, while in oral speech, it is the memory and the organs of articulation. Likewise, in music, notes are the sign-bearer of musical notation, while the human voice is the sign-bearer of music’s implementation. This topic has not yet been properly investigated and formalized. As a result, the role of musical instruments in the process is not quite clear. Sign-system – a set of signs that is built on a particular foundation. Its purpose is to enable people to process the signs instead of their referents. The processing of signs in a signsystem occurs according to the rules of the system’s metalanguage. Sign-systems may be classified in a variety of ways. For example: 1. One of the most fundamental types of classification is based on the degree of abstraction of the basic signs in the sign-system. This type of classification is particularly interesting, because it represents both the structures of sign-systems and their historical development in on-

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

387

to- and phylogenesis. The following types of signsystems are identifiable in a classification based on degree of abstraction. In human development, each type of sign-system in the list came into existence after the previous type was internalized by its users; each new stage subsumed the previous one, but also developed it further (see also overlapping of sign-systems): a. Natural sign-systems b. Iconic sign-systems c. Language systems d. Notations e. Mathematical sign-systems (formalized codes) Note: This last category is divided into two groups, formalized systems whose signs have fixed meanings and formalized systems with variables (as in symbolic logic or algebra; see mathematical sign-system). 2. Sign-systems may be classified by their modes of construction: a. Linear construction – sign-systems that are built consecutively b. Periodic construction – sign-systems that are divided into classes (groups) whose features are repeated periodically c. Composite construction – sign-systems that include various groups whose algorithms of processing may be quite disparate. 3. Sign-systems may be classified based on whether they are open or closed. 4. Sign-systems may be classified based on whether they were planned in advance or came into existence chaotically (see chaotically created sign-systems).

388

Supplement III

5. Sign-systems may be classified based on whether they serve as languages for constructing other systems (like linguistic or mathematical sign-systems; see textual code) or whether they are applicable only in a specific situation. Signification (semiosis) – a semiotic process that results in the creation of signs and their systems. This process requires that there be a signified, a sign, and an interpreter of the sign (a human being) who is conscious of the fact that a particular sign represents something in ontological or semiotic reality. Signified (referent) – that which is denoted by a sign. Social appraisal of signs and sign-systems – the value placed on a sign or sign-system by society. This valuation defines the boundaries of their distribution in human knowledge. It can also completely change the meaning of the whole signsystem. For example, postage stamps, which are usually issued to indicate that a required postal fee has been paid, can be turned into objects for inclusion in collections (philately). In this case, the role and weight of each member in the collection will be quite different from its role and weight in the original postal system. Step in a semiotic algorithm – one of the consecutive actions that is demanded by an algorithm for a particular semiotic application. Not only is the defined sequence of signs important, but also the gaps between the steps, which may vary in duration or be interrupted by instructions from outside the system. Consider, for example, the Morse-code alphabet, which consists of dots and dashes. When the dots and dashes are used to transmit a message, the durations of the gaps be-

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

389

tween them show whether they mark the breaks between letters, words, or paragraphs. Strategy of using signs and sign-systems – the methods that developers of sign-systems employ to process signs. Strategies may change as new kinds of signs and sign-systems are developed. The more sophisticated the signs and systems are, the more complex the strategy of processing them is, and the more time it takes to prepare people for dealing with them. Furthermore, the transition from a less sophisticated type of system to a more complex one can bring about a revolution in our way of thinking. This has been the case, for example, as the use of computers has spread and become very common in our times. See also algorithms, logic of processing signsystems. Symbol: 1. A basic sign in mathematical systems. Two types of such symbols exist: a. Symbols that have fixed connections to their referents. For example, F usually means “force” in physics, and “function” in mathematics. Within their systems, each of these symbols has a fixed connection to its referent. b. Symbols with completely arbitrary connections to their referents, like algebraic and logical variables. These symbols can accept any referent of a type that is suitable for it and for the system. 2. A trait of a sign that endows it with an allegorical force, usually of cultural or religious origin. In Christian tradition, the image of a cross, derived from the cross on which Christ was crucified, has acquired this type of symbolic power. This trait is evident in many

390

Supplement III

signs, such as the crucifix and various gestures that represent the crucifix. I call this allegorical aspect the ideological content of a sign. Signs endowed with ideological content constitute a special group in the framework of semiotics, and must be investigated differently from signs of the more common, non-ideological type. This class of signs has specific properties and rules of use. Synonyms – signs or expressions that have different forms (see form of a sign) but the same meaning. Synonyms exemplify semiotic congruence; they can be used to group signs that signify related referents and to transform relative signs within a system. Thus, most mathematical transformations are made by replacing the original expressions with synonyms. See also antonyms and homonyms. Syntagmatic level of syntax – the level of syntax that regulates the collection of basic and syntactic signs into syntagmas (the smallest nuclei of the text that have extra-systemic meaning). Following the rules of syntagmatic syntax ensures that our sign manipulations are moving in the correct direction. If we have built them correctly, we can then gather our syntagmas together in complete sentences and texts. Syntactic components of a sign – information about a sign’s potential or overtly expressed syntactic ties; this information is part of the sign. For example, the syntactic components of a noun are all of its morphological variations. The syntactic components of a musical note are the different forms it takes in various notations. As signs become more abstract, their syntactic components take on a greater role. In the most abstract signs, they completely supplant the denotational part of the sign. This is true, for example, of algebraic notations.

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

391

Syntactic constructions – rules that define how all the signs in semiotic texts should be arranged. Syntactic constructions are divided into two categories: those related to arranging signs in extended strings, and those responsible for the configuration of a complete semiotic field (definition 2). Syntactic elements in denotational signs – tokens that are placed within denotational signs even though they are not part of the denotation itself, because they indicate the syntactic category to which the sign belongs. For example, the markings on a clock face are arranged in a way that allows us to simultaneously derive hours, minutes, and seconds. To this end, each fifth mark on the face is drawn longer than the rest. Like the other marks, this mark functions as an indicator of minutes for the minute hand, but, at the same time, it also functions as an indicator of hours for the hour hand. Of the sixty marks around the face of the clock, twelve are elongated in this way. The length of the mark is, in this case, a syntactic element within the denotational sign of the mark. Because of this syntactic element, we only need one set of markings on a clock face; without it, we might require three different circles on a single clock face to indicate hours, minutes, and seconds. Syntactic sign – a type of functional sign that is used to bind denotational signs together in order to produce syntagmas and, ultimately, complete texts. In combination with logical signs, syntactic signs define the order in which the denotational signs should be interpreted and provide keys for understanding the significance of their morphologic forms (see morphologic paradigms). Orientation marks and syntactic links also belong to this category. For example, a comma is a syntactic sign that completes a thought but at the same time indicates that it is not entirely finished and will be continued.

392

Supplement III

A period, by contrast, is a syntactic sign that closes a thought as a complete unit. Syntactic ties of a sign – components of a sign that define its actual or potential relations with other signs or with the global syntactic configuration. Syntactic ties vary from sign to sign. The simplest signs may consist exclusively of their designation and have no syntactic ties at all. For example, the polar star in the sky is composed only of its denotation, which is “the direction that is north.” However, diagrams of this sign usually also include Ursa Major. This addition is a syntactic tie, which helps us find the polar star. At the other end of the sign-continuum, signs that are composed exclusively of syntactical forms (“boxes”) can be found. For example, the fullerenes that were recently discovered in chemistry are composed of pure syntactic ties. They can be filled with any chemical elements that are appropriate for a particular construction. Algebraic and logical variables are also examples of signs that are composed exclusively of syntactical forms. Syntagma – the shortest meaningful fragment of a semiotic text. Syntagmas can take different forms, depending on the type of text. They can be linear in writing or in chemical equations, part of a figure in a drawing, etc. Syntagmas allow us to approximately predict the final result of a transformation we are aiming at and judge whether ongoing systemic operations are correct at that point. Syntax in sign-systems – methods used to join denotational signs together into ordered sequences, either by means of special syntactic signs or by implementing underlying syntactic constructions that specify how each sign should be placed into the field.

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

393

Systemic sign (functional sign) – a sign that signifies order within semiotic reality; that is, a sign that is used to process other signs. Systemic signs are also called functional signs; they can be either syntactic or logical. Signs that are not systemic are called “signs of out-of-system denotation,” “out-ofsystem signs,” or “denotational signs.” Systemzwang – the tendency of a sign-system to bring about internal uniformity. Systemzwang is a characteristic of systems that causes the accepted system patterns to be imposed on every innovation. The more planned and orderly the system is, the stronger its systemzwang. T Term has different meanings, depending on the signsystem. For example, its meaning in logic is not the same as its meaning in mathematics. In linguistics, term means a word that has a special meaning in a particular science or practical activity. Terms are frequently collected in terminological dictionaries or lexicons of the fields in which they are used. Some terms are used both in their scientific domains and in more general contexts, so that they appear both in special lexicons and in dictionaries of the natural language to which they belong. Thus, such widely used words as “hammer,” “pliers,” and “saw” are found both in lexicons of carpentry and in general English dictionaries. Text in semiotics – a meaningful excerpt from a string of signs that belongs to a particular sign-system. An excerpt must be complete both in substance and in form. Usually, a text in semiotics is a linguistic text, but it may also be of a different nature – pictorial, mathematical, musical, etc. Any sign-system can produce texts.

394

Supplement III

Textual code – a type of sign-system that can be used by the sign-systems of many other scientific and practical fields. Examples of this type of sign-system are languages, mathematics, and logical notations. Textual codes stand in contrast to highly specialized sign-systems that can only be used for one type of application (see also operational sign-systems). Textual level of syntax – the level of syntax in signsystems in which the construction of texts is finalized with the help of various signs. The work of all the previous levels of syntax (morphologic, syntagmatic, and sentence levels) culminates in this level, which has its own armory of rules. When we arrive at this level, we put the finishing touches on our venture, both in terms of the content and the form of the text we have created. Topography of a semiotic field – the collection of all of the algorithms that apply to all of the semiotic groups in a semiotic field. A semiotic field can be divided into a number of semiotic groups, each of which is handled using a distinct algorithm of rules. For example, algebra is a semiotic field that includes, among many other groups, second and third degree equations. The rules for working with each of these groups of equations were discovered and formulated by different mathematicians at different times. In addition, students of algebra study these rules separately. Nevertheless, these rules have a lot of common features and are all included in the semiotic field of algebra. Together they form its topography. Translation from one sign-system into another – the process of converting the signs of one sign-system into a form that is usable in another, non-concurrent sign-system. The translation process is carried out by a translator – either a human or a machine.

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

395

Type of sign-system – a group of sign-systems that includes all those systems whose basic signs have the same degree of abstraction. I have identified five types of signsystems: 1. Natural sign-systems 2. Iconic sign-systems 3. Language systems 4. Notations 5. Mathematical sign-systems (formalized sign-systems) The last type has two forms: 1. Mathematical sign-systems whose signs have fixed referents 2. Mathematical sign-systems with variable signs. (See also sign-system.) V Variability of sign-systems – the capacity of sign-systems to accept different forms of encoding for the same phenomenon. Two types of variability exist: 1. Variability in which signs of different degrees of abstractness are acceptable. One example is counting, in which one can count by enumerating real objects, images, words, etc. 2. Variability in which alternative signs with the same degrees of abstractness are acceptable. Musical arrangements for various instruments and for voice performance are an example of this type of variability. Likewise, different systems of colors that are all based on the same seven components of the spectrum, such as

396

Supplement III

those used for color TV, photography, or color printing present this kind of variability. In this latter case, the variability is expressed as a number of alternative signsystem registers. Variable signs (variables) – signs that represent other, unknown signs, and are replaced by these other signs during sign transformations. Thus, variables in algebra are replaced by betwixt & between signs (which, in practical applications, take the form of denotational signs). Variables have very high degrees of abstraction, second only to empty syntactic spots. Visuality in signs – the capacity of signs to look like their referents. It is well-known that “a picture is worth a thousand words,” and “seeing is understanding.” When a sign bears a resemblance to its referent, people often find it easier to grasp. In systems of relatively low abstraction – namely, in natural and iconic sign-systems – this preference for sign visuality is easily met. Thus, these systems tend to ensure some sort of affinity between their signs and the external and/or internal essences of their referents. But as we move on to more abstract sign-systems, the signs become more conventional and do not tend to bear any likeness to what they signify. Nonetheless, even abstract signsystems have special means for producing intelligible visual results. This form of presentation helps our minds accept discoveries that are based on sign manipulations, even if the signs do not externally resemble things in nature. One means of doing this is empirical testing of those discoveries. Empirical testing makes abstract schemes clearly visible. Still, people prefer interacting with signs that have an external likeness to the things they signify, and, given the opportunity, they will always choose to switch to signs that do so. An example of this is the way pictures of the earth that were

Vocabulary of Semiotic Terms

397

taken by satellites and spacecraft have quickly replaced many conventional maps and charts. People are more comfortable using these pictures to orient themselves because the pictures more closely resemble the earth as they see it. W Weight of a sign – the ways in which a particular sign affects the entire system and is conversely affected by it. Weight depends on many factors, the most significant of which are the syntactic constructions that define the current position of the sign, and the primary role of the sign in the sign-system. The same sign may have different weights, depending on its current position in the system. For example, in a number, the figure “2” may appear in various positions: a “2” in the ten’s position of a number has a different weight from a “2” in the one’s position. Word – the basic sign of a language system. A word can denote something in reality or something that has a functional role within the sign-system itself. Words are primarily conventional signs (see conventionality in signs).

SUPPLEMENT IV PREVIOUSLY PUBLISHED WORKS ON SEMIOTICS

Below are sources in which you can find additional works of mine on semiotics, works that were published before this book was written. These sources are all in English. 1. Monograph: Semiotics and Linguistics. Paris, Editions de Ecrivains, 2001. 2. Journal: Chinese Semiotic Studies. Nanjing Normal University Press, China: a. “On the Theory of General Semiotics,” vol. 3 no. 1, September 2010 b. “Philosophical Aspects of Semiotics,” vol. 5, no. 1, September 2011 c. “Compound Signs,” vol. 7, no. 1, September 2012 d. “A Semiotic Perspective on the Language of Science,” Issue 8, December 2012 e. “On Frege’s ‘Modes of Presentation’ in Signs,” vol. 10, no. 1, 2014 3. My personal web page: http://it-claim.ru/Persons/Solomonick/ SolomonickAbraham_en.htm:

Previously Published Works on Semiotics

a.

b. c. d. e. f. g. h. i.

399

“A New Model of Semiotics as a Science of Signs, Sign-systems, and Semiotic Activities (Philosophical Foundations)” “Some Sign-system Classifications” “Dictionary of Semiotic Terms” “Language of Science” “Philosophical Aspects of Semiotics” “Merged Signs” “About the Three Realities” “On Frege’s ‘Modes of Presentation’ and the Relativity of Our Knowledge” “New Characteristics of the ‘Sign’ Notion in Semiotics”