A growing body of research within life science: molecular, developmental, and evolutionary biology, animal behavior, and cognitive sciences (represented by psychology, neuroscience, neurobiology, and cognitive science), employs the term “communication” in the descriptive and explanatory practices. Processes that are subsumed under this notion include—but are not limited to—interactions between single cells, cell ensembles, organisms of varying complexity, both unicellular and multicellular, and at times between animals and artifacts (such as computers). However, this complex role of the term “communication” in the scientific practice of biologists has hitherto received limited attention.

The current project seeks to answer the question whether the parallels that researchers draw between the linguistic and symbolic communication, and the signaling-based communication that happens in much simpler biological systems are justified, based on an empirical study of a large corpus of scientific papers from life and cognitive sciences. Overall, the project seeks to develop an empirically relevant understanding of “communication” in life science, one that allows for systematic and informative use of this term in the study of a broad variety of biological phenomena, and that can guide further research both in philosophy of science, as well as in life science itself.