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Instructors: Dr. Joachim Schult
Event type:
Seminar
Displayed in timetable as:
BIO-GdN-VERTS.60-974
Hours per week:
2
Language of instruction:
German
Min. | Max. participants:
5 | -
More information:
The seminar is intended to highlight and discuss the current situation in the sciences and point to problems which have become clear, for example, by new methods and techniques in research ( e.g. “data mining”). Further topics are the still existing dominance of the reductionism and the missing epistemological theory. The biosemiotic approach, which may be helpful for this problem, should be presented.
Comments/contents:
In the seminar, the current situation in the sciences will be examined and discussed. Problems will be pointed out that have become apparent, for example, through new techniques and methods of data extraction ("data mining"). Further topics are the still existing dominance of reductionism and the lack of an epistemological foundation. A potentially helpful approach to this problem - biosemiotics - will be presented.
On the one hand, the seminar will discuss the epistemological foundations of Darwin's theory of evolution and the fundamental differences to predecessor theories. This fundamental difference, or rather progress, was not seen in the subsequent period and the reductionist position that had been common until then was partly retained in research.
Since the middle of the 19th century, strong tendencies towards reductionism and an associated theory deficit have been discussed and criticised by some authors in the natural sciences
In connection with the morphology that dominated biology at the time, Ernst Haeckel (1966), for example, writes:
„Indem sich nun die große Mehrzahl der Zoologen und Botaniker mit dem Aufsuchen, Ausgraben und Herbeischleppen; dieser Bausteine begnügt und in dem Wahne lebt, daß diese Kunst die eigentliche Wissenschaft sei, indem sie das Kennen mit dem Erkennen verwechselt, .kann es, uns nicht wunder nehmen, wenn der Bau unseres wissenschaftlichen Lehrgebäudes selbst noch unendlich hinter, den bescheidensten Anforderungen unserer heutigen Bildung zurück ist. Der denkenden Baumeister sind nur wenige, und diese wenigen stehen. so vereinzelt, daß sie unter der Masse der Handlanger. verschwinden und nicht, von den letzteren verstanden werden. „
These differences and the relevance for biology and also the other natural sciences will be discussed. Boltzmann refers to Darwin's work as the most important work of the time Bergson " the time of mechanics is not the time of living consciousness" Prigogine refers to the 19th century as the century of the theory of evolution. It was the turning point towards a historical model, i.e. events are always the consequence of previous events, developments are not reversible
Boltzmann calls Darwin's work the most important work of this period Bergson " the time of mechanics is not the time of living consciousness" C. S. Peirce (1931-58), whose approach -semiotics- will be presented here, dared to design the universe of classical mechanics in favour of an evolutionary universe at a time when no experimental results were available (anticipatory evolution probability tychism.
Semiotics (semeion=sign) is a relatively young interdisciplinary science that claims to enable a paradigm shift in the life sciences. In biosemiotics, the sign character of biological processes is examined and the organism is no longer regarded as purely mechanical and determined, but as an independently interpreting system.
In the seminar, the current development of semiotics in the tradition of C.S. Peirce will be presented and an overview of the theoretical and instrumental use of this approach and the models based on it (Morris, Sebeok etc.) will be given. Examples from biology illustrate the enormous and pioneering importance of semiotic approaches for practical work in the life sciences. (cf. Oehler 1979, Schult 2004). The limits of the conventional reductionist approach became increasingly apparent and with it the need for a theoretical basis that takes into account the dynamics of highly complex systems with their large number of interactions and thus the importance of the relations of the system components (Eder and Rembold 1992). It is precisely this dominance of dynamics and interaction as well as the consideration of the system as a whole that corresponds to the principles of semiotics.
In this context, it also becomes clear that molecular biology does not in itself contain a new paradigm for biology. It merely highlights -perhaps more than other biological disciplines- the need for new theoretical approaches that focus on the importance of systemic relations rather than on the structural elements themselves, as is the case in semiotics. Interesting, complementary theoretical approaches supporting this thesis can be found -except in Peirce- also in Deppert and Uexküll as well as in the new physics (Planck 1948). In these works, concepts such as purpose - according to Peirce a sub-unit of "final causation", meaning, sense and spirit, causality and the topic of permissible and appropriate questions in the natural sciences are discussed (Deppert 1992, Uexküll 1984: 23).
Difficulties in the establishment and reception of this approach should also be pointed out. In this regard, a statement by Bertalanffy: (Bertalanffy, L. v. (1932): Theoretical Biology. Vol. 1. Borntraeger Berlin: 3)
„Wenn also eine theoretische Biologie“ auf die konkrete, biologische Forschung Einfluß zu nehmen beabsichtigt, dann wird ihre erste Maxime sein müssen, nicht eine Philosophie überhaupt, ja nicht einmal eine Philosophie des Lebens zu sein, sondern in die Aufgabenkreise des Naturforschers zu verbleiben;“
It is necessary to demonstrate the advantages of the biosemiotic approach for biological research with concrete examples.
The current situation is still such that almost no zoologist working in empirical research even knows the term "biosemiotics". There is also often a doubt about the necessity of such theoretical foundations.
Unfortunately, contributions are rejected by genuinely biological journals because of the theoretical approach they contain and by theoretical journals because of the empirical material.
This is also underlined by a comment by Kalevi Kull:s
"Indeed, the situation at present is that the journal Biosemiotics has not yet learned how to deal with empirical biosemiotic studies that use detailed biological material. On the other hand, traditional biological journals have not yet learned how to deal with papers that use a biosemiotic approach. So there are n o journals for empirical biosemiotic studies yet.
The epistemological parallel developments between physics and biology should also be addressed here.
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