Evolutionary Biosemiotics and Multilevel Construction Networks

Abstract

In contrast to the traditional relational semiotics, biosemiotics decisively deviates towards dynamical aspects of signs at the evolutionary and developmental time scales. The analysis of sign dynamics requires constructivism (in a broad sense) to explain how new components such as subagents, sensors, effectors, and interpretation networks are produced by developing and evolving organisms. Semiotic networks that include signs, tools, and subagents are multilevel, and this feature supports the plasticity, robustness, and evolvability of organisms. The origin of life is described here as the emergence of simple self-constructing semiotic networks that progressively increased the diversity of their components and relations. Primitive organisms have no capacity to classify and track objects; thus, we need to admit the existence of proto-signs that directly regulate activities of agents without being associated with objects. However, object recognition and handling became possible in eukaryotic species with the development of extensive rewritable epigenetic memory as well as sensorial and effector capacities. Semiotic networks are based on sequential and recursive construction, where each step produces components (i.e., agents, scaffolds, signs, and resources) that are needed for the following steps of construction. Construction is not limited to repair and reproduction of what already exists or is unambiguously encoded, it also includes production of new components and behaviors via learning and evolution. A special case is the emergence of new levels of organization known as metasystem transition. Multilevel semiotic networks reshape the phenotype of organisms by combining a mosaic of features developed via learning and evolution of cooperating and/or conflicting subagents.

Biosemiótica: Hacia Una Teoría General De Los Signos De La Naturaleza Humana Y No Humana

“…Esta división estaría estrechamente unida a dos escuelas biosemióticas de la Teoría unificada (biosemiótica del signo y código biosemiótico), que basadas en la filosofía de Peirce y en los resultados de la ciencia moderna, no conciben la biosemiótica en el sentido de Anton Markoš, como biosemiótica hermenéutica, sino dentro de procesos de interdisciplinariedad entre ciencias naturales y humanidades (Barbieri, 2009) 13 . Respecto a la biosemiótica hermenéutica, algunos teóricos 12 Recientemente, según señalan algunos autores como Alexei A. Sharov, existiría también una interpretación a nivel celular (eusemiosis); una idea presente ya incluso en los análisis sobre animales de autores como Sebeok y Uexküll (Sharov, 2016). 13 La biosemiótica hermenéutica fue propuesta en 2002 por Anton Markoš en su libro Readers of Biosemiótica: hacia una teoría general de los signos de la naturaleza humana y no humana habrían respondido a esta concepción afirmando que una síntesis entre biología y semiótica no podría sostener un reduccionismo de tal magnitud, y que se tendría que diferenciar entre el concepto de información de la física teórica y la biología (concept of information), por un lado, y el concepto de significado de la lingüística (concept of meaning), por otro lado (Barbieri, 2003(Barbieri, , 2009.…”

Introduction: a Structural and Historical Approach to Understanding Advancements in Evolutionary Theory

“…These behaviors give pause to attempts at offering wide sweeping reductionist ontologies and require offering different, revisionist ontologies to accommodate the possibility that many of these organisms are both signcarriers and sign-interpreters (Sharov 2018). Given that biosemiotics understands evolution to be a multi-level process (Sharov 2016), biosemiotics provides a route for developing a non-reductionist accounts for evolution. A non-reductionist approach involves looking at the natural sciences as well as the social sciences to develop a better account of evolution.…”

Composite Agency: Semiotics of Modularity and Guiding Interactions

“…However, Peirce's approach is not universal; it is applicable only to agents with advanced interpretation capacities (e.g., capacity to identify, characterize, and track objects) (Sharov and Vehkavaara 2015). Thus, I use a generic definition: “sign is something that repeatedly and consistently regulates or guides the actions of organisms or their subagents (e.g., cells or molecular complexes) in a useful way” (Sharov 2016c). Signs are always represented by material carriers, often called as ‘sign vehicles’, whereas the capacity of agents to interact meaningfully via sign exchange represents the ideal component of signs.…”

“…It offers a simpler path towards attaining useful knowledge than the traditional methodology of objectivism which sees the goal of science in knowing the true state of the world. Although ‘constructivism’ is mostly an epistemological concept, I consider it in a broader sense, including ontological construction of body parts and subagents by living organisms (Sharov 2016c). The reasons for such generalization, which was inspired by the theory of autopoiesis (Maturana and Varela 1980), are that (i) the construction of body parts and subagents is regulated according to a heritable program - an early predecessor of mental knowledge; and (ii) the emergence of mental constructs (e.g., representations or models) is assumed to be supported by physical construction and remodeling at the level of molecular subagents, synapses, and neurons.…”

“…However, more recent studies included adaptability and anticipation (Yolles 2006). Studying of evolution is impossible without understanding the interactions of construction processes at multiple scales from functional molecules to organisms, colonies, and consortia (Sharov 2016c). In this paper, I focus on the problem that requires all three components: biosemiotics, constructivism, and evolutionary theory.…”