Biosemiotic affects
A naturalistic account of “meaning”
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 24225481 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Felice Cimatti (University of Calabria , Arcavacata di Rende , Italy) |
| Year | 2026 |
| Volume | 2026 |
| Issue | 272 |
| Pages | 1-23 |
| Publication date | 2026-09-25 |
| Open Access | Yes |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Semiotica (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 0037-1998 • E-ISSN: 1613-3692 |
| Publisher | Walter de Gruyter GmbH (PUBLISHER • DE) |
| DOI | 10.1515/sem-2024-0132 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 28 |
Biosemiotics suggests that every vital relation is, in fact, a semiotic relation. Consider the case of a virus “selecting” the “correct” cellular receptor to enter a cell. This behavior does not imply the existence of preferences, consciousness, or subjectivity; rather, the virus “selects” a receptor by excluding all other possibilities through specific semiotic relationships. To avoid the common risk of vitalism – the fallacious assumption that living entities are endowed with an original, mysterious subjectivity – we must interpret the phenomenological field as the direct result of these peculiar semiotic, yet entirely natural, relationships. In this perspective, meaning is a product of semiosis, not its starting point. A virus, like any other natural entity, discovers itself as a phenomenological entity by entering into semiotic relationships that internally generate a biological “sense.” By prioritizing a biosemiotic analysis over qualitative phenomenology, we can develop a robust, naturalistic theory of meaning. This approach allows us to ground the phenomenological aspects of living entities firmly within a naturalistic framework, avoiding the pitfalls of vitalism while explaining how biological “sense” arises as a necessary, natural consequence of semiotic interaction within the broader phenomenological field.
| Highly cited | No |
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