ABSTRACT
The chapter addresses Charles S. Peirce’s and John Dewey’s conceptions of habits and also brings into the conversation several research findings in neuroscience and neuroethics. The chapter affirms the significance of real-life, and often dramatic, experiences for human learning and growth. Dewey’s own experience of his psychological crisis was informative for him in recognizing the existence of unconscious factors and the intertwining of physical and mental health. The task of education and therapy boils down to maintaining the balance of the unconscious and consciousness. Human intelligence grows and develops via a mediating relation that creates an “interpretant” for real-life problematic situations. The chapter addresses some therapeutic and pedagogical practices using a specific example of psychotherapy oriented to self-formation in the context of semiotics. Semiotic subjectivity emerges in the midst of transactional dynamics and acquiring a new habit of habit change. The chapter also reflects on the presence of Eros in the evolutionary process of semiosis.
