Human beings are a species of animals. Yet how can human thought and language be part of the natural world? Teleosemantical theories hold the promise of an integrated naturalistic theory of thought and language, especially Ruth Millikan’s Biosemantics. Her account is sometimes seen to have shortcomings, when it comes to understand our rational and social practices. Robert Brandom’s Normative Pragmatism provides answers to those issues. His program suffers from problems that can be solved from a biosemantical perspective. The general aim of the project is to integrate Normative Pragmatism in the perspective of Biosemantics. The focus of the subprojects will be on concepts, norms, and subjectivity. The project aims at a naturalistic understanding of those essential features of the human mind.

SNSF (Swiss National Science Foundation)

• Funktionsbegriff und Teleologie
• Evolution und Adaptation
• Mensch und Tier