Exact sciences and the semiotics of existence

Abstract

We have to ask first why exact and natural sciences have so modest place in Tarasti’s theories. The answer is in the role of subject and subjectivity. At first sight it may seem to be ignored in scientific discourse, but in fact it is strongly present. One may list fields of subject to be studied: nature of scientific creativity, emergence of meaning in exact sciences, scientific approach to the problem of existence and infinity, presence of transcendence. All these involve semiotic problems. Yet, since Galilei and Newton, scholars are used to separate subject and object. In fact, Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg and Martin Heidegger all worked in the 1920s and were able to distinguish subject and object, often one obscure and the other clear. Like Gilbert Durand says about conscious and unconscious. In speech act theory sign becomes itself an object. Self-referential approaches take place when communication of the world (primary communication) turns into communication of communication (higher order communication). Meaning emerges often via metaphors which have a creative power. Jacques Hadamard saw similarity between psychology of mathematics and how Mozart represents musical creativity in his letters. In Tarasti’s theory the moment of illumination is crucial and so it is as well in mathematics like Henri Poincare said. There is also the issue of irrationality: how signs emerge after all. By transcendence ultimately we encounter high spirituality, high complexity and high surprise. We can prepare a list of types of existence and the semiotic one among them.