In existential semiotics, Eero Tarasti introduces the notion of the zemic world as the fundamental structure of empirical existence. This model articulates Dasein into four interconnected entities: body, person, praxis, and values, which Tarasti designates respectively as Moi1, Moi2, Soi2, and Soi1. The zemic world is not a static configuration but a dynamic field in which meaning is continuously produced through semiotic movements.
Tarasti defines the zemic model as the articulation of “real empirical existence in Dasein,” emphasizing that it provides a systematic account of how lived experience is structured semiotically. The body (Moi1) represents the corporeal dimension of existence, while the person (Moi2) corresponds to the socially and psychologically constituted self. Praxis (Soi2) designates the subject as an acting agent within professional, cultural, or institutional roles, and values (Soi1) refer to abstract norms and ideals that regulate and orient social life.
Within this fourfold structure, Tarasti identifies two fundamental semiotic movements. The first is a movement of sublimation, which proceeds from the body toward values. This trajectory describes how corporeal existence gradually transforms into abstract forms of meaning, norms, and ideals. The second movement is that of embodiment or “corporisation,” whereby abstract values descend toward corporeal realization. These two movements operate simultaneously, ensuring that the zemic world remains a field of tension between materiality and abstraction.
Empirical transcendence emerges precisely within this internal dynamism of the zemic model. Tarasti notes that some critics have interpreted transcendence merely as the level of Soi1, that is, as the domain of social values and norms functioning as “invisible categories.” He accepts this interpretation as valid, explicitly defining it as one species of transcendence, which he calls empirical transcendence. In this sense, transcendence refers to what is not immediately present yet remains operative within consciousness and cultural structures.
Tarasti offers a concise formulation of this idea when he states that “the easiest definition of transcendence in this case is: it is whatever is absent — but present in our minds.” Absence thus becomes a central semiotic principle. Values, norms, expectations, and intelligible structures guide action and interpretation precisely because they are not materially present. This conception resonates with sociological traditions that emphasize the role of shared, non-visible frameworks in social life.
The zemic world, however, is not governed solely by automatic or organic processes. Tarasti insists that the subject is not “at the mercy of a blind organic zemic process.” At certain moments, the subject can interrupt this process through reflection, either by negation or affirmation. Although such interruptions lead beyond the zemic level, the zemic model itself remains the indispensable foundation upon which these acts occur.
By articulating body, person, praxis, and values within a unified semiotic framework, Tarasti’s zemic model provides a precise account of how meaning is generated within empirical existence. It shows how transcendence is already embedded in everyday life, not as a metaphysical abstraction, but as a structural feature of signification. In this way, the zemic model establishes the conditions under which higher forms of transcendence may later be approached, without presupposing them.
Bibliographic reference: Eero Tarasti, Culture and transcendence – the concept of transcendence through the ages, in Semiotics and Its Masters, Volume 1, De Gruyter Mouton.