Preface

For Lord Byron, who was an adventurer and probably a thrill seeker, the pleasure in the “pathless woods” may have been the result of the thrill associated with the uncertainty, promise, and danger of traveling in an unknown territory. I am neither an adventurer nor a thrill seeker. However, from a very young age, I have found great pleasure in traveling the pathless woods of knowledge. A kind of a wimpy adventurer, you may call me. These travels have led me to very varied territories of human knowledge, from experimental psychology (Neuman and Weitzman 2003) and psychoanalysis (Neuman 2009a) to mathematical modeling (Neuman et al. 2012); from theoretical biology (Neuman 2008) to semiotics (Neuman 2009b); and from discourse analysis (Neuman et al. 2001) to innovative information technologies (Neuman et al. 2013b). What is interpreted by some of my colleagues as a symptom of an academic multiple personality disorder is for me a natural and legitimate expression of a deep intellectual passion.

Knowledge is not naturally demarcated by borders, and wherever borders exist in our minds they indicate our tendency to force order in a simplistic way and to follow the social power relations of academic politics. Physicists who study the semantic networks of language are not linguists, but their contribution to our understanding of human language is indispensable. Should this work be appreciated despite the fact that it transcends disciplinary boundaries? My answer is: yes!