This paper explores the difference between companion animals and domestic livestock from the viewpoint of neo-cybernetical informatics, referring to an educational trial which was to raise a young pig for eating. The problem in this trial is based on an informatic difference between seeing a pig as a friend and as food in daily lives. Our behavior as being a communicational actor should be distinguished from just being a non-communicational sign interpreter because we can assume ethical norms as long as a communication system continuously operates. This argument can be a starting point for developing a new discussion on ethical issues, not in terms of the difference of intelligence or the importance of lives, but in terms of the possibility of construction of a communication system with us.

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Toward a new fundamental theory of information, this paper discusses the relationship between autopoiesis theory and biosemiotics, or to put it in a broader way, the relationship between systems theory and semiotics. As the first step in our analysis, we will also examine the cybersemiotics of Søren Brier and Fundamental Informatics of Toru Nishigaki. We are here concerned with methodological issues related to a possible framework for a unified theory of information. The question we would like to ask is what kind of philosophical suppositions are important as bases for a new information theory.