Abstract
The article aims to provide a general framework for assessing and categorizing the cognitive systems of human and non-human animals. Our approach stems from biosemiotic, ethological, and phenomenological investigations into the relations of organisms to one another and to their environment. Building on the analyses of Merleau-Ponty and Portmann, organismal bodies and surfaces are distinguished as the base for sign production and interpretation. Following the concept of modelling systems by Sebeok, we develop a concentric model of human and non-human animal cognition that posits three intertwined spheres: corporeity, social communication, and culture. The model explicitly works with the pluralistic perspective that views the communication and cognition of humans as distinct, but not superior to those of non-human animals. Our position is substantiated by two case studies: the first one focuses on the acquisition and spread of nut-cracking technique among the chimpanzees in the Täi forest, the second one on the communication and cognition of deafblind persons. From an epistemological perspective, our paper is a contribution to contemporary attempts to link biosemiotics and ethology with phenomenological concepts of agency, living bodies, and lifeworld.
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Notes
Martinelli (2010: 27) considers Umwelt theory mostly as “an upgrade to Darwinian Gradualism”. In fact, such an attitude is on the verge with any standard interpretation of Uexküll, as it runs into warning “not to discuss anymore the differences across species in terms of qualitative distinctions” (Martinelli 2010: 44). This profoundly contrasts with the Uexküllian view of diffuse discontinuities as introduced by Brentari (2018).
Our contribution should not be understood as adhering to an Uexküllian puritanism. Influenced by an evolutionary-ontogenetic approach, we fully acknowledge the usefulness of the concept of umwelt transition (Tønnessen 2011) and recognize that a one-sided endorsment of umwelt theory can obscure many phenomena of interspecies communication (cf. Lestel 2011b). If biosemiotics is not to dissipate in a Darwinian sea, it is necessary to maintain its identity through links to traditions in evolutionary biology other than Darwinian, as in our multiple references to the work of Portmann in this article.
Let us just briefly note that from Abram’s animistic position, expressivity can be perceived in all perceived objects (see Abram 2017: 77–78).
For a resolution between signs and signals and its connection with the phenomenality of animal umwelten see Tønnessen et al. (2018: 4).
See Tønnessen (2014: 291): “In terms of umwelt, i.e. subjective experience, we gradually individuate and become first animal, then human, then eventually persons.”
The social brain hypothesis of Dunbar (1998) switches the relation between communication and brain and posits that the rise in brain capacity is a consequence of the rising demands for social communication among humans.
It is not possible to mention here all positions taken in the so-called animal language controversy. We do not reject the claim, for example, that humpback whales demonstrate rudimentary elements of syntax in their songs: this, however, in no way proves an ability to endlessly form encoded meanings. Thus even Martinelli (2010: 159) is forced to admit that we do not have any evidence that whales produce anything analogous to the “linking signs” used in human speech.
Cf. de Waal (1999: 636): “The ‘culture’ label befits any species, such as the chimpanzee, in which one community can readily be distinguished from another by its unique suite of behavioural characteristics.”
Part of this video is available online: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PfSpYljl7AA - see especially 1:01:40.
To help us understand what is happening in this case, Linell uses Trevarthen’s analysis of intersubjectivity. Trevarthen (1979) argues that there are three main levels of intersubjectivity in human personal development. Primary intersubjectivity is the level at which an individual interacts with another. At the level of secondary intersubjectivity, third objects start to play a role in these interactions and an individual learns to analyse the whole situation by dividing it into parts that can be pointed at and named. The third stage of intersubjectivity means relation to non-present subjects and objects, for example through texts. What we see in the video with Ingerid and Gunnar Vege exploring the crab is Ingerid’s transition from the stage of primary intersubjectivity to the stage of secondary intersubjectivity. Ingerid herself is not able to do this step alone – she relies on Vege’s patient attempts to teach her something, using his hands as an extension of her own senses and trying willingly to initiate her into a world conceptualized by other humans throughout history. This new competence to analyse the situation opens her possibilities of self-expression and full-fledged communication (cf. Linell 2017; Gallagher 2017). Thus, tertiary subjectivity in the sense of Trevarthen is a special subgroup of what we call culture: assignment of this level of intersubjectivity is only possible in a social context involving personal guides who have already achieved this stage; see also below.
In her autobiography, Helen Keller describes her passion for hunting guinea-fowl eggs in long grass with her friend Martha Washington. She notes: “I could not tell Martha Washington when I wanted to go egg-hunting, but I would double my hands and put them on the ground, which meant something round the grass, and Martha always understood” (Keller 2012: 5–6). This description shows spontaneous use of primitive pantomimic signs in Keller’s attempt to communicate with Martha and also that there is a certain shared experiential history that allows Martha to understand Helen’s primitive message. On the other hand, Keller in this period of time struggled a lot with her own disability to communicate full-fledgedly, which indicates that instrumental use of signs is not sufficient (ibid.: 8–10).
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Acknowledgements
We wish to thank Andrew G. Christensen for English language editing and translation of some sections, and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments. The research for this article was supported by the Czech Science Foundation (GAČR) project “Adolf Portmann - a pioneer of the eidetic and semiotic approach in the philosophy of the life sciences” (grant number 19-11571S).
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Jaroš, F., Pudil, M. Cognitive Systems of Human and Non-human Animals: At the Crossroads of Phenomenology, Ethology and Biosemiotics. Biosemiotics 13, 155–177 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-020-09387-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12304-020-09387-8