Form, substance and difference

pp. 501-518

in: Donald Favareau, Essential readings in biosemiotics, Berlin, Springer, 2009

Abstract

The elementary cybernetic system with its messages in circuit is, in fact, the simplest unit of mind; and the transform of a difference travelling in a circuit is the elementary idea. …The way to delineate the system is to draw the limiting line in such a way that you do not cut any of these pathways in ways which leave things inexplicable. G. Bateson (1972: 465)