This paper sets a framework for using semiotics as an analytical method for Earth system science. It illustrates the use of such a method by analysing a dataset consisting of 32,383 abstracts of research articles pertaining to Earth system science, modelled as semantic networks. The analysis allows us to explain the epistemological advantages of this method as originating in the systems thinking common in both Earth system science and semiotics. The purpose of this methodological proposal is that of bringing the recent and critical planetary boundaries framework to the attention of ecosemiotics and biosemiotic criticism, and vice versa. Ecosemiotics is a branch of the biosemiotic modelling theory and is thus grounded in Charles Peirce’s schematic semiotics, but also developed in inspiration of Juri Lotman’s systemic semiotics. Both of these foundations of ecosemiotics are compatible with the rationale of Earth system science, given the schematism of Peirce’s semiotics and Lotman’s notion of meaning as an affordance of the biosphere. Far from exhausting the hermeneutic possibilities evoked by the discussed dataset, we argue that such semiotic analysis, made possible by the digital capacity of modelling large amounts of data, reveals new horizons for semiotic analysis, particularly regarding humans’ modelling of the environment.

中文翻译：

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地球系统科学中的符号学方法的案例：环境研究的语义网络

本文建立了一个使用符号学作为地球系统科学分析方法的框架。它通过分析一个数据集，说明了这种方法的使用，该数据集由32383篇涉及地球系统科学的研究论文摘要组成，并被建模为语义网络。分析使我们能够解释这种方法在认识论上的优势，这种优势源于地球系统科学和符号学共同的系统思维。该方法学建议的目的是使生态符号学和生物符号学批评引起人们的关注，同时也提出了新的批评。生态符号学是生物符号学建模理论的一个分支，因此以查尔斯·皮尔斯（Charles Peirce）的示意性符号学为基础，但也受到朱里·洛特曼（Juri Lotman）系统性符号学的启发而发展。鉴于皮尔士的符号学的示意图和洛特曼将意义视为生物圈的涵义，这两种生态符号学的基础都与地球系统科学的理论相吻合。我们认为，这种符号学分析并没有穷尽所讨论的数据集所带来的解释学可能性，而是通过对大量数据进行建模的数字化能力而实现的，揭示了符号学分析的新视野，特别是在人类对环境的建模方面。