New considerations on the proper study of Man - And, marginally, some other animals

Abstract

In Order to differentiate the semiotic capadties of animals and human beings we need to understand more exactly wfaat these properties are. Instead of identifymg all vehicles of meaning with signs, we certainly have to spedfy the notion of sign, but it will also be necessaty to provide an inventory of other kinds of meaning, staiting out from perception, and going through a number of intermediate notions such as affordances, markers, and surrogates before reaching signs and sign systems. This essay proposes a phenomenological description of a few kinds of meaning, which is not meant to be exhaustive, but still should give an idea of the complezity of the task. It suggests that not only the setting up of semiotic levels and hierarchies of evolution and development, but even, to some extent, the comparison of the capadties of anitnak and human beings must go band in hand with advances in phenomenological observations.