About
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The Tree of Meaning (TOM) is about the ‘rediscovery’ of a hidden ‘language organ’—more accurately, a ‘Meaning organ’—that resides in the unconscious minds of language users, and has so far gone undetected and unacknowledged by modern science.
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Like its physiological counterparts in the human body, this Meaning organ functions autonomously in the background of our experience; however, unlike physical organs that maintain the body’s homeostasis and health, the Meaning organ performs a number of vital functions that help orient us in the world: (1) It forms the Meaning substrate of the world’s languages; (2) is a higher order organ of perception through which we ‘see’ the world; (3) is nature’s solution by convergence to consciousness in human beings; and (4) is an internal compass or guide for the individual user.
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TOM’s mission is to describe the aforementioned functions of the Meaning organ, examine how they work together, and to integrate this new-found territory (and knowledge base) into our conception of natural languages in particular, and human cognition in general. To that end, there is a dedicated link on the Learning page of the website for content relating to each of the components of the Meaning organ outlined above, under the rubrics— ‘Perception’, ‘Languages/Meaning Systems’, ‘Consciousness’, and ‘Internal Navigation’ respectively.
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The author and guardian of this website is Malcolm David Lowe, an independent researcher from Charlotte, North Carolina, USA. Malcolm has a keen interest in the genesis of languages, Meaning, language acquisition and consciousness. His research forms the basis of the content found at the TOM website. The author has presented his ideas at a number of conferences and workshops in the US and in Europe (see “Chronology of Presentations” below).
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For access to the author’s Academia.edu site, click on the link: https://independent.academia.edu/malcolmlowe
Chronology of Presentations
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How Languages Create Mind Space and the ‘Analog I’ (The 2013 Julian Jaynes Society Conference on Consciousness and Bicameral Studies, Charleston, West Virginia, USA, June 2013)
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Languages Encode Meaning and Grow on the Basis of Hidden Design Features (23rd Annual International Conference of the Society for Chaos Theory in Psychology & Life Sciences, Portland, Oregon, USA, July 2013)
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An Alternate Paradigm for Understanding the Emergence and Growth of Languages (6th International Nonlinear Science Conference of the Society for Chaos Theory in Psychology & Life Sciences, Nijmegen, Netherlands, March 2014)
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A Network Approach to Understanding the Emergence and Growth of Languages (7th Chaotic Modeling and Simulation International Conference, Lisbon, Portugal, June 2014)
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Understanding the Inner Architecture of Languages (8th Chaotic Modeling and Simulation International Conference, Paris, France, May 2015)
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The General Architecture of Languages Holds Key to Consciousness (The Science of Consciousness TSC2018, Tucson, Arizona, USA, April 2018)
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Visualizing Languages as Networks of Meaning (Virtual Presentation) (13th Chaotic Modeling and Simulation International Conference, Florence, Italy, June 2020)
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The Hidden Architecture of Meaning in Languages (Virtual Presentation) (Chaotic Modeling & Simulation International Web Conference, October 2020)
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Consciousness: From Correlation to Explanation (Poster Presentation Video) (The Science of Consciousness TSC2022, Tucson, Arizona, April 2022)
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The Linguistic Roots of Consciousness (The Science of Consciousness TSC2023, Taormina, Sicily, Italy, May 2023)
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Chaos Theory and The Deep Structure of Meaning in Languages (Virtual Presentation)(16th Chaotic Modeling and Simulation International Conference, Heraklion, Crete, Greece, June 2023)
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Name, Number and the Foundation of Consciousness (Models of Consciousness 2023, Oxford University, Oxford, UK, Sept. 2023)
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Meaning Systems 101 (Society for Mind-Matter Research Members Workshop, Loews Ventana Canyon Resort, Tucson, AZ, USA, April 2024)
