Synthesizing the findings from a wide range of disciplines – from biology and anthropology to philosophy and linguistics – the emerging field of Biosemiotics explores the highly complex phenomenon of sign processing in living systems. Seeking to advance a naturalistic understanding of the evolution and development of sign-dependent life processes, contemporary biosemiotic theory offers important new conceptual tools for the scientific understanding of mind and meaning, for the development of artificial intelligence, and for the ongoing research into the rich diversity of non-verbal human, animal and biological communication processes. Donald Favareau’s Essential Readings in Biosemiotics has been designed as a single-source overview of the major works informing this new interdiscipline, and provides scholarly historical and analytical commentary on each of the texts presented. The first of its kind, this book constitutes a valuable resource to both bioscientists and to semioticians interested in this emerging new discipline, and can function as a primary textbook for students in biosemiotics, as well. Moreover, because of its inherently interdisciplinary nature and its focus on the ‘big questions’ of cognition, meaning and evolutionary biology, this volume should be of interest to anyone working in the fields of cognitive science, theoretical biology, philosophy of mind, evolutionary psychology, communication studies or the history and philosophy of science.

The first of its kind, Donald Favareau's "Essential Readings in Biosemiotics" constitutes a valuable resource to both bioscientists and to semioticians interested in the emerging new discipline of Biosemiotics, and can function as a primary textbook for students in biosemiotics.

Combining research approaches from biology, philosophy and linguistics, the field of Biosemiotics proposes that animals, plants and single cells all engage in semiosis – the conversion of objective signals into conventional signs. This has important implications and applications for issues ranging from natural selection to animal behavior and human psychology, leaving biosemiotics at the cutting edge of the research on the fundamentals of life. Drawing on an international expertise, the book details the history and study of biosemiotics, and provides a state-of-the-art summary of the current work in this new field. And, with relevance to a wide range of disciplines – from linguistics and semiotics to evolutionary phenomena and the philosophy of biology – the book provides an important text for both students and established researchers, while marking a vital step in the evolution of a new biological paradigm.

This book presents contexts and associations of the semiotic view in biology, by making a short review of the history of the trends and ideas of biosemiotics, or semiotic biology, in parallel with theoretical biology. Biosemiotics can be defined as the science of signs in living systems. A principal and distinctive characteristic of semiotic biology lies in the understanding that in living, entities do not interact like mechanical bodies, but rather as messages, the pieces of text. This means that the whole determinism is of another type.

This book presents programmatic texts on biosemiotics, written collectively by world leading scholars in the field (Deacon, Emmeche, Favareau, Hoffmeyer, Kull, Markoš, Pattee, Stjernfelt). In addition, the book includes chapters which focus closely on semiotic case studies (Bruni, Kotov, Maran, Neuman, Turovski). According to the central thesis of biosemiotics, sign processes characterise all living systems and the very nature of life, and their diverse phenomena can be best explained via the dynamics and typology of sign relations. The authors are therefore presenting a deeper view on biological evolution, intentionality of organisms, the role of communication in the living world and the nature of sign systems — all topics which are described in this volume. This has important consequences on the methodology and epistemology of biology and study of life phenomena in general, which the authors aim to help the reader better understand. Contents:Why Biosemiotics? An Introduction to Our View on the Biology of Life Itself (Kalevi Kull, Claus Emmeche & Jesper Hoffmeyer)Biosemiotic Approach: General Principles:Theses on Biosemiotics: Prolegomena to a Theoretical Biology (Kalevi Kull, Terrence Deacon, Claus Emmeche, Jesper Hoffmeyer & Frederik Stjernfelt)Biology is Immature Biosemiotics (Jesper Hoffmeyer)Biosemiotic Research Questions (Kalevi Kull, Claus Emmeche & Donald Favareau)Organism and Body: The Semiotics of Emergent Levels of Life (Claus Emmeche)Life is Many, and Sign is Essentially Plural: On the Methodology of Biosemiotics (Kalevi Kull)Applications:The Need for Impression in the Semiotics of Animal Freedom: A Zoologist's Attempt to Perceive the Semiotic Aim of H Hediger (Aleksei Turovski)The Multitrophic Plant-Herbivore-Parasitoid-Pathogen System: A Biosemiotic Perspective (Luis Emilio Bruni)Structure and Semiosis in Biological Mimicry (Timo Maran)Semiosphere is the Relational Biosphere (Kaie Kotov & Kalevi Kull)Why Do We Need Signs in Biology? (Yair Neuman)Conversations:Between Physics and Semiotics (Howard H Pattee & Kalevi Kull)A Roundtable on (Mis)Understanding of Biosemiotics (Claus Emmeche, Jesper Hoffmeyer, Kalevi Kull, Anton Markoš, Frederik Stjernfelt & Donald Favareau)Theories of Signs and Meaning: Views from Copenhagen and Tartu (Jesper Hoffmeyer & Kalevi Kull) Readership: Semioticians, biologists and those interested in the philosophy of science. Keywords:Biosemiotics;Theoretical Biology;Semiosis;Biocommunication;Semiotics;Philosophy of Biology;EthologyKey Features:This is a unique collection of the major recent contributions by the leading scientists in the field of biosemioticsThis volume will for the first time present a collective view of the group of scholars who have built the current understanding of biosemiotics (i.e. the community of researchers emanating from the major biosemiotic centers of Copenhagen and Tartu into other places worldwide)

This edited volume provides a biosemiotic analysis of the ecological relationship between food and medicine. Drawing on the origins of semiotics in medicine, this collection proposes innovative ways of considering aliments and treatments. Considering the ever-evolving character of our understanding of meaning-making in biology, and considering the keen popular interest in issues relating to food and medicines - fueled by an increasing body of interdisciplinary knowledge - the contributions here provide diverse insights and arguments into the larger ecology of organisms’ engagement with and transformation through taking in matter. Bodies interpret molecules, enzymes, and alkaloids they intentionally and unintentionally come in contact with according to their pre-existing receptors. But their receptors are also changed by the experience. Once the body has identified a particular substance, it responds by initiating semiotic sequences and negotiations that fulfill vital functions for the organism at macro-, meso-, and micro-scales. Human abilities to distill and extract the living world into highly refined foods and medicines, however, have created substances far more potent than their counterparts in our historical evolution. Many of these substances also lack certain accompanying proteins, enzymes, and alkaloids that otherwise aid digestion or protect against side-effects in active extracted chemicals. Human biology has yet to catch up with human inventions such as supernormal foods and medicines that may flood receptors, overwhelming the body’s normal satiation mechanisms. This volume discusses how biosemioticians can come to terms with these networks of meaning, providing a valuable and provocative compendium for semioticians, medical researchers and practitioners, sociologists, cultural theorists, bioethicists and scholars investigating the interdisciplinary questions stemming from food and medicine.

The first international volume on the topic of biosemiotics and linguistics. It aims to establish a new relationship between linguistics and biology as based on shared semiotic foundation.