Facts for Kids

An umwelt is the special way a living thing sees and feels its world. It comes from a German word that means "surroundings." Scientists like Jakob von Uexküll used the idea to show that bees, dogs, people, and even tiny animals live in different versions of the same place. Each version is shaped by the animal’s senses, past experiences, and what matters most to it, such as food, shelter, or danger.

Because every species notices different things, two animals can be in the same park but have very different inner worlds. What do you think your umwelt notices first when you go outside?

Thinking about umwelten helps people in many fields. Jakob von Uexküll and Thomas Sebeok used the idea to study how animals and humans make signs and meaning. Today scientists and engineers use it in places like cognitive science, robotics, and cybernetics to build machines that sense the world in useful ways.

For example, a robot with a camera makes a different kind of umwelt than one with sonar. Designers use the idea to decide which signals a robot should pay attention to, so it can act and learn in its surroundings.

An umwelt is like a personal map your mind makes from the bits of the world you can sense. Your eyes, ears, nose, and touch pick up signals, and your brain chooses which ones are important. These important bits are called carriers of significance because they carry meaning for the animal, like food smells or safe hiding places.

Animals keep changing their umwelt by acting and learning. This back-and-forth of sensing and doing is called a functional circle: you notice something, you respond, and that response gives you new information. So the mind and the world fit together for each creature.

Many animals have very different umwelten. For example, a tick uses three simple clues to find a warm animal: a special smell, the right skin temperature, and the feeling of fur. These clues are enough for a tick’s small inner world.

Other examples: bees see flower patterns and use a dance to tell friends where nectar is; sea urchins sense touch and currents to find food; dogs build rich worlds from smells that seem almost like pictures. Each example shows how senses shape what matters most to an animal.

Some thinkers say the umwelt idea fits animals well but might not tell the whole story about people. Philosopher Josef Pieper argued that humans live in a larger kind of world, called Welt, because people can use reason and imagination to go beyond immediate senses. He traced this idea back to old thinkers like Plato and Aristotle.

Others say humans also have umwelten, just more flexible ones. Which do you think matters more: the world your senses give you, or the world your thoughts can imagine?

When two or more umwelten meet, they can form a shared space of signs and signals. Scientists call this a semiosphere. In that space, animals send and read messages—like birds singing to mark a nest or bees dancing to share a flower’s location. These shared signs help animals live together or warn each other about danger.

Sometimes groups of animals build a team version of an umwelt for the whole group, called a collective umwelt. Ants and bees show this by working as one and sharing information in ways each member understands.