Observing and Knowing Through the Eyes of Semiotics

One of the things I love about Denmark is the availability of numerous easy popular science books in Danish. Denmark is really special in this respect. I am not talking just about the successful T?nkepauser series, there are many such collections as well as countless excellent individual books. This small nation is a superpower when it comes to disseminating great ideas in a reader-friendly way.

How do I know if a popular science book is worth reading? One simple test is if it can help you to elegantly answer a French Bac philosophy exam. Strange test? Here is a simple example:

Suffit-il d’observer pour conna?tre? Is observing enough for knowing? As is the practice in the French Bac philosophy exam this question is phrased very broadly and could be answered from many different directions. I believe a fitting answer is supplied by S?ren Kj?rup excellent book in Danish Semiotik.

Semiotics is the study of language. Natural languages certainly qualify for examination under this field, but so is every form of symbol. The underlying idea of this scientific inquiry is that some form of expression, either a spoken word, a written word, or a picture is supposed to represent or to refer to something else.

Take a simple example: a picture of a specific horse is supposed to represent or to refer to one specific animal. What if the picture is inaccurate, for example, if the painter used the wrong color? Does the picture still refer to the specific horse even it doesn't fully resemble it? The answer is, of course, positive. In contrast, if a picture from the 16th century somehow resembles a current Hollywood actor, the picture certainly doesn't refer to this actor. It could be used as a reference if applied as such ("who does this picture remind you of?"), but so can everything else that shares any characteristic with that actor—I could even refer to a tree and say that the actor is just this high—but the picture itself does not refer to the actor.

Why is that important for the question under consideration? Because when we observe things, we may see them as they really are and still be unable to comprehend the things that they refer to. I could see a page written in Chinese well enough, but I would not be able to understand it. I would not know the content of the text, because I cannot understand the way symbols are used as indexes for certain meanings in the Chinese language.

You may think that this is only relevant for languages, but the same applies to any creation of a sentient being. I would not be able to understand fully a picture of Michelangelo even if I observe it if I do not possess the relevant cultural knowledge to understand the symbols behind it. If you haven't studied the topic, you would not understand a Jewish wedding ceremony for the same reason. People are using objects, figures, signs, movements, and any other form of expression to refer to meanings that are not immediately available in the act itself: they serve as indexes for something else. Observing, in that case, isn't enough for knowing.

What about things that are not created by humans—such as a natural forest. Unless one believes that these natural phenomena were created by God according to a certain intelligible plan, they are not referring to anything. But the perceptions of these objects by people, in contrast, are regulated by people's culture and language. I can observe a forest and I will know about some of its qualities, but without understanding the way different cultures treated this forest, I will not know all there is to know about the forest itself.

So observing is not enough for knowing. If by knowing you mean understanding the intellectual implications of anything from a work of art to natural objects, seeing by itself would not provide you that knowledge.