Finite semiotics: A new theoretical basis for the information age

This paper argues that the arrival of the information age and its “attention economy” compels a new theoretical stance for semiotics: that semiosis is a function of the finiteness of human cognition and the allocation of that resource by the intermediating world. On this basis, and proceeding from only basic ontological commitments regarding cognition, a model is sketched that offers novel definitions of sign, semiosis, and semiotics, and develops two new analytical constructs: the semiosic field and semioformation. The new theoretical standpoint is illustrated with two related examples. Firstly, a finite semiotic examination of metacognition, exemplified by “memory”, is used to reveal a contradiction in the direction of its supposed recovery of thought and the occasion of its recovery. Secondly, such “recovery functions” are shown to be a central mechanism exploited by technology to restructure cognition and categories of the real. Their further study is proposed as an important area for semiotics