This paper explores the ecological importance of Andrew Stables’ notion of learning as interpretative. The broadly encompassing framework for educational research that Stables enabled is nurtured by a specifically semiotic and hermeneutic notion of learning that upsets certain assumptions which are deeply rooted in the intellectual history of modern (Western) educational philosophy and pedagogy. While Stables’ semiotic view on education broadly enjoys much appreciation in scholarly circles, I point to some of its specific aspects that are of particular importance but may pass unnoticed. For Stables, that learning is interpretative means that what enables learning is also what limits it. Arguably a simple observation, this contradicts the anthropocentric modern view, fueled by economic ideologies, that learning is a linear and potentially limitless growth that consists in the accumulation of information, quantitatively. The latter implies the dissociation of human learning from the environment, that learning does not necessarily materialize in environmental consequences. Also, in this view, learning is equated with a fixed and Western culturally biased idea of development through language acquisition. Based on this assumption, modern education justifies humans’ unrestricted exploitation of natural resources and environments for and because of humans’ endless growth through supposedly objective knowledge. On Stables’ account, learning is environmental because it does not only open new possibilities for action, but it also obscures some. Learning is a complex, subjective and dialogical phenomenon. This supports theories that view interpretation as environmental, such as Gibson’s ecological theory of perception, and as embodied, such as cognitive linguistics and enactivism. I explore these intricacies and conclude that Stables’ theory of learning can be seen as a genuine contribution to ecosemiotics.