Symmetry Expands the Potential of Peircean Semiotics

Abstract

Abstract I focus on the history of energy, symmetry, and symmetry breaking as unifying conceptions connecting previously isolated fields of inquiry. This narrative proceeds through three stages. The first concerns the establishment of the principle of conservation of energy in the second half of the 19th century. The second depicts the emergence of the concept of symmetry and its central role in relativity and quantum physics. The third stage follows the rise of the notion of symmetry breaking from a seminal paper by Pierre Curie to its present pervasive role in explanation and concept unification, and in bridging previously separated disciplines, such as quantum chromodynamics, condensed matter physics, and cosmology. Applications of these ideas to biology and semiotics are noted.