Language: "Signaling and semiotics: a search for meaning"

Official URL: https://dx.doi.org/10.4324/9781315188911

In this paper, we argue that a duality of language exists in financial economics in that branch of the agency theory literature that is called signaling, signaling theory, and the signaling principle of finance. We show that the signaling contention violates rudimentary rules of logic. Yet, the duality of language, in the framework of semiotics, opens new avenues of inquiry. During the Passover holiday, a rabbi sits on a bench in a public park, eating a piece of matzo (unleavened bread). Sharing the bench with him is a blind, homeless person. The rabbi feels sorry for the poor man, and, to do a mitzvah (worthy deed), he breaks off a piece of the matzo and gives it to the man. The blind man runs his fingers across the piece several times and finally exclaims, “Who wrote this nonsense?".