Pathways to the Origin and Evolution of Meanings in the Universe

Alexei A. Sharov is the vice president of bioinformatics at Elixirgen Scientific in Baltimore, USA. He holds a Ph.D. in ecology and entomology from Moscow State University in Russia. He’s the editor of Journal Biosemiotics, published 4 books, and 180 peer-reviewed papers. Sharov has organized three conferences on biosemiotics. George E. Mikhailovsky is the president and CEO of Global Mind Share in Norfolk, USA. He has a Ph.D. in biophysics from Moscow State University in Russia and a DSc in systems ecology from P.P. Shirshov Institute of Oceanology. Currently, he is the editor-in-chief of the Journal of Evolutionary Science and has published 5 books and 100 peer-reviewed papers.

• Preface xvAcknowledgments xixPart I: The Nature of Meaning and Its Components 11 Introduction: Towards Integrating Studies of Meanings with Science 3Alexei A. Sharov2 Pathways to the Understanding of Signs and Meanings in the Biosphere: Historical and Contemporary Perspectives 27Donald Favareau and Kalevi Kull3 Is it a Janus-Faced World After All? Physics is Not Reductionist 55Bashir Ahmad and Richard Gordon4 Semiotic Ground and the Hierarchic Nature of Information 71Terrence W. Deacon5 Ontology and Semiotics of Memory 85Anton V. Sukhoverkhov and Arran E. Gare6 Meanings, Their Hierarchy, and Evolution 101George E. Mikhailovsky7 Semiotics of Potential Meanings 137Alexei A. Sharov8 A Constructivist Approach to Meanings in the Universe 167Alexander KravchenkoPart II: Meanings in the Evolution of Life 1879 Chemical Origins of Life, Agency, and Meaning 189Alexei A. Sharov10 Evolution of Biomolecular Communication 217Gustavo Caetano-Anollés11 Meaning Relies on Codes but Depends on Agents 245Robert Prinz12 Evolutionary Growth of Meanings in the Relational Universe of Intercommunicating Agents 265Abir U. IgamberdievPart III: Meanings in Organism Behavior and Cognition 27913 The Sentient Cell 281Arthur S. Reber, Frantisek Baluska and William B. Miller, Jr.14 A Hypothesis about How Bacterial Cells Sustain and Change Their Lives in Response to Various Signals 299Vic Norris and Alexei A. Sharov15 Self-Reinforcing Cycles and Mistakes: The Emergence of Subjective Meaning 325Victoria N. Alexander16 On the Energy-Based Limitations of the Information Capacity and Information Processing Rates in the Human Brain 345Jack A. Tuszynski17 The Peculiar Case of Danger Modeling: Meaning-Generation in Three Dimensions 363Hongbing YuPart IV: Meanings in Humans and Beyond 37718 Anchors of Meaning: The Intertwining of Signs, Abduction, and Cognitive Niches 379Lorenzo Magnani19 Levels of Translation, Levels of Freedom? 401Kobus Marais20 Towards a Biosemiotic Account of Memes as Units of Cultural Replication and Interpretation 419Ivan Fomin21 Astrobiosemiotics and Its Frontier with Astrobiology 439Julian Chela-Flores22 Time Horizons and Biosemiotic Adaptation: Taking Seriously Variable Temporalities in the Evolution of Possible Life Forms 453Yogi H. Hendlin and Constantijn-Alexander KustersDeclaration 467References 467Index 471