The first part of this paper shows how our concepts (seemingly precise and clear-cut) in both linguistics and biology in fact represent very fuzzy and improperly defined entities that shimmer against the background of the world. The second part develops on such a knowledge: we argue that both language and evolution are distributed among many entities and processes on many time- and space- scales. As such, they can be grasped only by tools that allow extraction of meaning – like semiosis and/or narration.