Article

Connaissance sémiotique et Mathématisation. Sémiogenèse et explicitation Semiotic Cognition and Mathematisation. Semiogenesis and Explication

in Versus n. 118, Semiotica e matematiche/Semiotics and Mathematics, pp.141-170

Abstract (english)

This paper examines the use of mathematics in semiolinguistic studies, from the double point of view of principles of objectivation and intelligibility. After a brief survey of logicist
approaches, we discuss the paradigm of Morphodynamics and the legacy of Catastrophe Theory. This leads us to criticize the use of mathematics in terms of schemas of objectivation and determination for semiotic phenomena. Taking into account the necessity of inscribing semiogenetic and hermeneutic dimensions at the basis of semiotic knowledge, we propose a view of semiotic science as a process of explicitation (in contrast to objectivation) supported by a diagrammatic intelligence which uncovers the most authentic meaning of mathematics in those fields.