ABSTRACT
This paper develops a unified account of our experience of signs, drawing on Husserl’s Logical Investigations. It argues that semiotic experience is grounded in mereological experience. Specifically, to experience a as an indication (Anzeichen) of b, we must experience both as parts united within a whole, and to experience x as an expression (Ausdruck) of y, we must experience x as a part of y. Even our experience of signs that have a “surrogative function [stellvertretenden Funktion]” (e.g., numerals) the paper suggests, can be understood mereologically. Thus, Derrida’s claim that semiotic experience, for Husserl, fundamentally involves substitution is shown to be incorrect, and a new direction for research into the genesis of semiotic consciousness, and the question of animal and machine language use, is suggested.
