Following on from my question about differentiating intrinsic from Shannon information, I’d like to ask how this distinction affects theoretical models of intentionality and the emergence of semantic meaning in biological and cognitive systems.

In classical models, Shannon information quantifies uncertainty reduction but says nothing about meaning, function, or internal reference. By contrast, intrinsic information such as those discussed in frameworks like Dynamic Organicity Theory (Poznanski) or ODTBT, are defined by functional interactions, self-referential redundancy structures, and the restructuring of phase space across nested temporal scales.

In these models:

• Intentionality emerges from the internal dynamics of the system, not external stimuli
• Meaning is not encoded, but in many cases, structured, through phase interference, negentropic action, or informational holon dynamics
• Transductive oscillatory models suggest that meaning arises from system-organized coherence, not symbol processing

My question to the community: How have models of semantic grounding, intentionality, or consciousness formally integrated this notion of intrinsic (as opposed to extrinsic or Shannon) information?

Are there empirical paradigms or computational approaches that:

• Demonstrate how meaning emerges from the system’s internal structuring?
• Distinguish between signal-driven response and self-organized directive action?
• Quantify intentionality without invoking external encoding frameworks?

Any insights from information theory, theoretical biology, neuroscience, or semiotics are much appreciated.