“What is colour?”, “What is the precise meaning of the statement ‘the stock exchange closes at a 5% drop this evening’?”, “How are TV viewers defined?”, or “How can images produce meaning?” Such everyday questions are examined in this book. To make our analysis intuitive and understandable, numerous concrete examples illustrate our theoretical framework and concepts. The examples include gaming, fictional skits in leisure entertainment, and enigmas. The golden thread running through the text revisits the informational process and places the datum as its pivot.
The epistemological perspective of our novel approach is that of “radical relativity”. This is based on the precept that a perceptual trace carries with it the spectrum of the process that has engendered it. Given this, the informational tracking endeavour tracks the meaning-making process, notably through interpretive scaffoldings that leads to plausible realities.
Table of Contents
Introduction xiii
Chapter 1. The First Information Theories 1
1.1. Introduction 1
1.2. The mathematical theory of information by Shannon 3
1.2.1. Beginnings of this theory 3
1.2.2. Shannon’s generalization 5
1.2.3. Information and entropy 6
1.3. Kolmogorov’s algorithmic theory of information 7
1.3.1. Succinct presentation 7
1.3.2. First algorithmic information theory 8
1.3.3. Second algorithmic information theory 9
1.4. Delahaye’s further developments 10
1.4.1. Gaps 10
1.4.2. Information value 10
1.4.3. Raw information content 11
1.4.4. Pragmatic aspects related to information value 12
1.5. Final remarks 13
Chapter 2. Understanding Shannon through Play 15
2.1. Introduction 15
2.2. The game of tele-balls 16
2.2.1. Layout and rules of the game 16
2.2.2. Producing the source event 17
2.2.3. Channel and transmission 17
2.2.4. Transmission 18
2.2.5. End of the process 19
2.3. The teachings of the tele-ball game 19
2.3.1. The concept of “tele” 20
2.3.2. The technical grounding 20
2.3.3. The system’s language 21
2.3.4. Synchronization and the clock 21
2.3.5. Introduction to noise 22
2.4. The general diagram of communication/transmission 22
2.4.1. Schematic diagram of a general communication system according to Shannon 23
2.4.2. Extension to information beyond the game of tele-balls 24
2.4.3. Sense and nonsense 25
2.4.4. Electronic media designers at work 27
2.5. Conceptual confusion in the so-called information theories 29
2.5.1. Terminological shift 29
2.5.2. Weaver’s levels of information 29
2.5.3. Measuring information: the CONTAINER 30
2.5.4. Inaccuracies and easy approximations between content and container 31
2.5.5. Opening to other perspectives 31
2.6. Conclusion 32
Chapter 3. “Tele” before Shannon 35
3.1. Introduction 35
3.2. The speaking African drums 35
3.2.1. The speaking drums 36
3.2.2. The tone as bit 36
3.2.3. Redundancy 37
3.3. The problems of long-distance communication 38
3.3.1. The ancient solutions 38
3.3.2. The telegraph 39
3.3.3. The Morse system 42
3.3.4. Alpha bravo code 44
3.4. Conclusion 45
Chapter 4. Some Revisions of the Concept of Information 47
4.1. Introduction 47
4.2. A double-faced concept: Capurro and Hjørland 48
4.2.1. Towards an operational concept 49
4.2.2. An etymological exploration 49
4.2.3. Oppositions and relations, taxonomy and complexity 51
4.2.4. Going on… between measurable signal and signifying emergence 52
4.3. The Mathematical Theory of Information (MTI) as a starting point: Segal 52
4.3.1. Mathematics rejoining the Human Sciences? 53
4.3.2. A measure for meaningless information 53
4.3.3. A unifying project that bumped into semantics 55
4.3.4. The incursion of information in the Human Sciences 56
4.3.5. Beyond the MTI 58
4.4. The Diaphoric Definition of Data (DDD): Floridi 59
4.4.1. Information, data, meaning 59
4.4.2. A definition of information based on data 61
4.4.3. Diaphoric Definition of Data in three levels 62
4.4.4. Diaphorae and saliencies 63
4.4.5. Data as a relational entity 64
4.4.6. Beyond the DDD 67
4.5. A pattern-oriented approach (POA): Bates 68
4.5.1. A definition of information based on patterns 69
4.5.2. Discussion 70
4.5.3. Final considerations, with the aim of approaching diverse viewpoints 73
4.6. Founding statements for a theory of information 75
4.6.1. Information and meaning 75
4.6.2. Notion of data 76
4.6.3. Notion of signal 76
4.6.4. Notion of information 77
4.6.5. Notion of sense 78
4.6.6. Notion of message 79
4.6.7. Before concluding 80
4.7. Conclusion 81
Chapter 5. Conceptualization and Representations 83
5.1. Introduction 83
5.2. Natural and artifactual devices for producing representations 84
5.2.1. Meaning? Data processing, representation and information! 84
5.2.2. Hierarchization of representational capabilities 86
5.2.3. Computerized artifacts modeling natural devices 91
5.3. Human conceptualization 94
5.3.1. The relativity of the object 94
5.3.2. The relativity of appearance qualifiers 95
5.3.3. A rigorous formalization of human conceptualization 100
5.4. About what “exists” in common thought, in natural language and in formal language 101
5.4.1. Concepts: the chair, the table and the beginning 101
5.4.2. Conceptual trompe-l’oeil 102
5.4.3. Sensory perception and object genesis 104
5.4.4. Kantian philosophy, the “real” and “knowledge” 108
5.5. The resulting epistemological revolutions 110
5.5.1. Not data, but constructions about the world 111
5.5.2. A relevance horizon-oriented framework 111
5.5.3. The end of truth and objectivity 112
5.6. Conclusion 113
Chapter 6. From Captures to Data 115
6.1. Introduction 115
6.2. An illustrative sketch: a view of the human body 116
6.2.1. The “human specimen” horizon of relevance, defined by its visible forms 116
6.2.2. The “patient” horizon of relevance, defined by its symptoms 117
6.2.3. The “pathology” horizon of relevance, defined by a specialized examination 117
6.2.4. The “clinical case” horizon of relevance, defined by a debate about the case 118
6.2.5. The horizon of Information and Communication Sciences 119
6.2.6. The radical relativity of the “viewpoint” 119
6.3. From the interactional bath to distinction 120
6.3.1. Postulates 120
6.3.2. The supremacy of subjectivity 121
6.3.3. First phase: cut-out in the tissue of indistinct interactions 122
6.3.4. Second phase: generation of an object-entity 123
6.4. Diaphoric data and qualification? 124
6.4.1. Description at the heart of the problem 124
6.4.2. A reminder of the diaphoric approach 126
6.4.3. Zero degree: a-conceptual captures 127
6.4.4. From a-conceptual captures to the factory of views 128
6.4.5. Back to the qualifying phase of the object-entity 129
6.5. Conclusion 131
Chapter 7. From Data to Aggregates 133
7.1. Introduction 133
7.2. Data: raw material of the semantic chain 134
7.2.1. Batesonian perspective 134
7.2.2. Informational raw material 135
7.2.3. Third phase: qualification of the object-entity 135
7.2.4. Rigorous formalization of the qualification of an object-entity 137
7.2.5. From capta to data 138
7.2.6. An example: the map and the territory 139
7.3. Aggregates: meaningful superstructures 140
7.3.1. Back to patterns: essential data or mental constructions? 141
7.3.2. Back to Gestalt theory 142
7.3.3. Aggregates for scaffolding a point of view 143
7.3.4. Aggregate operations: a basic example 144
7.3.5. Coalescence as the foundation for interpretive scaffolding 147
7.3.6. Conceptual integration 149
7.3.7. Pareidolia for illustrating interpretive scaffolding by coalescence 152
7.3.8. In the end 155
7.4. Meaning: individual production or social construct? 158
7.4.1. A subjective, situational and pragmatic conception 158
7.4.2. A laying-out of incommunicable individual experience 159
7.4.3. Negotiated and shareable meaning 160
7.4.4. Public procedures for legalizing knowledge 161
7.4.5. The horizon of relevance underlying conceptualization 162
7.5. Conclusion 163
Chapter 8. Trace Deployment from Indexical Retention to Writing 165
8.1. Introduction 165
8.2. The trace as registered indexical retention 168
8.2.1. Spectrum: the trace as past retention 168
8.2.2. The Res: inscription in a physical mode of existence 171
8.2.3. Wrapping up 175
8.3. The search of the trace as evidence or proof 175
8.3.1. The Studium: the search for meaning in context 176
8.3.2. The Documentum: instruction of the “trace process” 180
8.3.3. Summarizing 185
8.4. The trace as writing 186
8.4.1. The Punctum: writing beyond evidence 186
8.4.2. Some complementary comments before concluding 189
8.5. Conclusion 191
Chapter 9. Interpretive Scaffoldings in Context 195
9.1. Introduction 195
9.2. Information and trace 195
9.2.1. Specter of a real process that took place 195
9.2.2. Retention registered on a medium 197
9.2.3. Qualified by a coherent and credible aggregate 197
9.2.4. Authentified by tracking 198
9.2.5. Traces without information, information without traces? 201
9.3. The horizon of expectation, by Hans Robert Jauss 202
9.3.1. For a reception-centered approach 202
9.3.2 Introduction to the notion of horizon of expectation 203
9.3.3 A generalized cognitive translation of the horizon of expectation 203
9.4. Relevance, according to Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson 204
9.4.1. Communication and information according to Sperber and Wilson 205
9.4.2. Taking the context into account 206
9.4.3. The principle of relevance 208
9.5. Weaving the horizon of expectation and the theory of relevance 209
9.5.1. Extractions and generalizations 209
9.5.2. Being bound to a horizon of relevance 210
9.6. Coalescence considered under the light of a horizon of relevance 211
9.6.1. An ordinary example from everyday life 212
9.7. Interpretive aggregate by means of example: visual sense-making 214
9.7.1. Visual captures 215
9.7.2. Aggregate emergence 216
9.7.3. The horizon of relevance, a framework for interpretation 217
9.7.4. Conclusion 223
Chapter 10. Realities under the Watch of Horizons of Relevance 225
10.1. Introduction 225
10.2. Back to the relation to the Real 226
10.2.1. Truth is a fiction 226
10.2.2. Substituting reality for truth 227
10.2.3. Circumscribing the real versus qualifying the real 227
10.2.4. Interpretive scaffoldings 228
10.3. Some examples 230
10.3.1. A sculpture by Camille Claudel 230
10.3.2. A vegetable 231
10.3.3. Cultural modulations of meaning 232
10.3.4. The seeds of discord 233
10.3.5. The windows and their points of view 233
10.3.6. Final considerations 235
10.4. Conclusion: legalization of meaning in the age of Digital Humanities 235
Conclusion 237
Bibliography 241
Index 253
