210 Abir U. Igamberdiev
INTRODUCTION: SEMIOSIS AND LIFE
Biological systems possess contextually determined semiotic relations within and
between them (Sebeok, 2001). This is manifested in the existence of different systems of
signification, the most fundamental of which is the genetic code. It possesses the properties
established by Saussure (1983) to all languages such as the arbitrariness of the sign and the
linear character of the signifier (signifiant). Even for the genetic code, there were attempts to
explain it in purely physical terms of steric correspondences however such explanation is not
substantiated by any evidence. Language can arise in a structure that has certain holistic mode
of behavior making possible a selective choice. From this point of view, the semiotic
approach to description of biological systems (Sharov, 1992) claims that the biosystem is not
simply fractionable into two functional parts, corresponding to a hardware and software. It
contains a significative system (genome) which encodes its structure, but in turn, the system
of significations is internally reproduced within the system and is repaired through the sets of
internal constraints coming from the elements that it encodes (Igamberdiev, 1992). Such a
system represents a single entity, with a locally stable point attractor (steady-state). Moreover,
it possesses other types of control besides error-based cybernetic controls. One of them is
based on an anticipation, in which some present action is taken, not to correct an error which
has already occurred, but to pre-empt an error which will occur in the absence of that action
(Rosen, 1985). The control here is based not on the past, but on the future through the agency
of a predictive model, which converts present information into predicted future consequences.
These consequences provide the basis for present actions. Such a control system works on the
basis of predictive models rather of cybernetic feedbacks.
To describe biological systems, the founder of biosemiotics Jacob von Uexküll
introduced the concepts of Umwelt and Funktionkreis (Uexküll, 1982). The Umwelt (German
word meaning ―surrounding world‖ or ―environment‖) designates the world in which
biological systems live, meaning that they not only inhabit but actively form and support it.
This world is not equal to the physical world but it has certain characteristics common to all
living systems which constitute a subset of this Umwelt – the common Umwelt,
corresponding to basic parameters of the physical world. The Umwelt is usually considered as
a ―subjective universe‖ (Uexküll, 1973; Sebeok, 1977) and the organisms can have different
Umwelts, even though they share the same environment (Kull, 1998). The physical spacetime
is really the most robust part of the system of interconnected Umwelts.
The Funktionkreis (functional cycle) describes all phenomena of the subject-specific
interpretation. The Funktionkreis operates through perception, interpretation and feedback
(Uexküll, 1982). From the modern point of view, Uexküll understands the interaction of an
organism and environment in nonlinear, dynamic-cyclical terms, involving feedback loops.
However this interaction should include internal holistic organization of a biosystem based on
its semantic closure. For Uexküll, the Funktionkreis is the theory of meaning
(Bedeutunglehre). In Uexküll‘s Funktionkreise, the signal caught by receptor is transformed
internally (in subject‘s inner world) to the effective action. This transformation has a semiotic
nature being internally determined. The reductionist study of system‘s structure will not help
in establishing this response. The Funktionkreise always includes recognition which does not
work in an algorithmic way (i.e. bit-to-bit checking) but possesses a mutual coherence of
forms. The fundamental feature of this structure is that each of its members signifies other