Semiotician's Toolkit

Beginning today, I will post, once a week, one of our (INT3RP INC's) 35 semiotic tools from our Symbologist's Toolkit. Today I start with, sort of randomly, Tool 2.2, The Virtureal Effect. And here's the real point--or question: who can give an example of how a given semiotic tool, in this case, "The Virtureal Effect," might be applied today in our efforts to better understand the world in which we live?

2.2 The Virtureal Affect: Because of the “Virtureal Effect,” real Symbologists (semioticians) can apply their understanding that the Sign of an Object can exist before the Object it stands for does! For example, Sherlock Holmes was a forensic detective in the virtual (fictional) world before there was ever a real forensic detective; the first real forensic scientist, Frenchman Edmond Locard (1877-1966), was called, ironically, the “Sherlock Holmes of France.” Life imitates art, indeed! Consider how many inventions today were first invented for the Star Trek television series.

Here is today's share (2/6/2021):

1.3 Origin Mining: Many Symbols and Signs originate by means of iconic (based on resemblance) and indexical (based on cause and effect) “stretching.” Take the letter “A,” for example, which stands for a small range of sounds in a linguistic code; turn the letter “A” upside down and you have an icon (a picture) of an animal head! Is it a coincidence that the first letter of the alphabet is one of humanity’s first icons (think, the caves of Lascaux)? The analogical picture of the head of the animal, then, when flipped over to make the letter “A,” represents the beginning of the digitalization of the sign! By studying the underlying iconic origin of signs we may be able to understand why they perform as they do. Marketing and branding semioticians can aply such insights in order to "ground" the images that they use to grow brands.