Meaning & reference

In IIT, meanings correspond to contents of experience—the meaning is the feeling. Meanings are thus fully intrinsic, but they usually refer to aspects of causal processes in the environment that are relevant to an organism. 

In physical terms, meaningful contents of experience typically correspond to Φ-folds composed of sets of highly interrelated distinctions. As such, meanings are always intrinsic to a complex: they are specified by mechanisms internal to it, over purviews internal to it, in the context provided by other parts of it. However, in a well-adapted organism, Φ-folds corresponding to intrinsic meanings can provide specific, unified, definite, and structured interpretations that provide inferences to a good explanation of sensory inputs.

Meanings come into being through an organism’s interactions with extrinsic entities, and with other regularities in the environment, in the course of both evolution and development. Meanings can be refined and learned by changing the connectivity of the brain to reflect ‘suspicious coincidences’ and ‘suspicious sequences’ that originate in the environment. In this way, though meanings are fully intrinsic, they can refer to extrinsic entities and events (extrinsic meanings). That said, meanings can also transcend reference, and new meanings can be invented.