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How Forests Think
Drawing on years of immersive fieldwork with the Runa people of the Ecuadorian Amazon, Eduardo Kohn’s *How Forests Think* dismantles long-held human-centric assumptions by exploring the semiotic lives of non-human beings. Rooted in Charles Peirce’s theory of iconic, indexical, and symbolic signs, Kohn argues that thinking isn’t a uniquely human trait: forests, animals, plants, and even ancestral spirits engage in dynamic semiotic processes to construct selves, navigate relationships, and shape the world around them. He unpacks core concepts like "constitutive absence," where meaning emerges from what’s not present, and examines the Runa’s animist worldview, their nuanced cross-species communication with dogs and jaguars, and how colonial history has reshaped their interactions with the natural world. Blending anthropology, philosophy, and ecology, this book invites readers to step beyond human boundaries, recognize the interconnected web of all life, and rethink what it means to "think" in an era of escalating ecological crisis.
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