Evolution of Semantic Systems

✍ Scribed by Dagfinn Føllesdal (auth.), Bernd-Olaf Küppers, Udo Hahn, Stefan Artmann (eds.)

• Publisher: Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
• Year: 2013
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 241
• Edition: 1
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Complex systems in nature and society make use of information for the development of their internal organization and the control of their functional mechanisms. Alongside technical aspects of storing, transmitting and processing information, the various semantic aspects of information, such as meaning, sense, reference and function, play a decisive part in the analysis of such systems.

With the aim of fostering a better understanding of semantic systems from an evolutionary and multidisciplinary perspective, this volume collects contributions by philosophers and natural scientists, linguists, information and computer scientists. They do not follow a single research paradigm; rather they shed, in a complementary way, new light upon some of the most important aspects of the evolution of semantic systems.

Evolution of Semantic Systems is intended for researchers in philosophy, computer science, and the natural sciences who work on the analysis or development of semantic systems, ontologies, or similar complex information structures. In the eleven chapters, they will find a broad discussion of topics ranging from underlying universal principles to representation and processing aspects to paradigmatic examples.

✦ Table of Contents

Front Matter....Pages i-xii
The Emergence of Reference....Pages 1-12
Pragmatism and the Evolution of Semantic Systems....Pages 13-29
System Surfaces: There Is Never Just Only One Structure....Pages 31-66
Elements of a Semantic Code....Pages 67-85
Talking About Structures....Pages 87-99
Toward a Formal Theory of Information Structure....Pages 101-126
Mechanics and Mental Change....Pages 127-150
Semantic Technologies: A Computational Paradigm for Making Sense of Qualitative Meaning Structures....Pages 151-173
What Are Ontologies Good For?....Pages 175-188
Taxonomic Change as a Reflection of Progress in a Scientific Discipline....Pages 189-208
Crystallizations as a Form of Scientific Semantic Change: The Case of Thermodynamics....Pages 209-230
Back Matter....Pages 231-232

✦ Subjects

Artificial Intelligence (incl. Robotics); Models and Principles; Coding and Information Theory; Philosophy of Technology; Semantics; Computational Linguistics