Packages: The Atoms of Communication

Abstract

A simple model of communication, the problems it poses and the conclusions at which it arrives are proposed. The following items are discussed. 1. The model: What interacts during communication are wrapped up objects, packages; packages can communicate only through signals; agents can respond only to their own interpretation of the signal that reaches them, i.e. to the meaning they assign to it. 2. Thus, some problems of communication, engendered by this model are: What is inside the partner package? Is communication just a discourse between the partners, or is it a real interac-tion, after all? 3. Finally, some implications of the model: Through communication, reality is inserted into semiotic (linguistic) settings; hence, reality turns into a proposition (sentence), rather than a physical-chemical structure; ‘states of affairs’ turn into statements; situations are stated, commu-nicated, problematised and resolved; reality, likewise the proposition, acquires meaning.