Words

Being able to apply grue-like predicates would allow one to instantly solve an infinite number of mysteries (historical, scientific, etc.). In this paper I’ll give a couple of examples. It is still a mystery whether George Mallory and Andrew Irvine managed to reach the summit of Mount Everest in 1924. The predicate “greverest” applies to an object if either the object is green and Mount Everest was scaled in 1924, or the object is not green and Mount Everest was not (...) scaled in 1924. The predicate “greverest” is interdefinable with the predicate “green”: the predicate "green" applies to an object if either the object is greverest and Mount Everest was scaled in 1924, or the object is not greverest and Mount Everest was not scaled in 1924. The predicate "non-greverest" applies to an object if either the object is non-green and Mount Everest was scaled in 1924, or the object is green and Mount Everest was not scaled in 1924. The predicate "non-green" applies to an object if either the object is non-greverest and Mount Everest was scaled in 1924, or the object is greverest and Mount Everest was not scaled in 1924. We know that the famous diamond called Golden Jubilee is not green. If someone (a greverest-speaker) informed us that the Golden Jubilee diamond is greverest, we would automatically come to know Mount Everest was not scaled in 1924. According to the definitions, a greverest object can only be either 1) green (in case Mount Everest was scaled in 1924), or 2) non-green (in case Mount Everest was not scaled in 1924). Since we know that the Golden Jubilee diamond is not green, if we come to know that the Golden Jubilee diamond is also greverest, we would automatically know from the definition of “greverest” that we are faced with case 2, the case in which the object is both non-green and greverest, and Mount Everest was not scaled in 1924. Vice versa, if someone informed us that the Golden Jubilee diamond is not greverest, we would automatically come to know that Mount Everest was scaled in 1924. According to the definitions, a non-greverest object can only be either 1) non-green (in case Mount Everest was scaled in 1924), or 2) green (in the case Mount Everest was not scaled in 1924). Since we know that the Golden Jubilee diamond is not green, if we come to know that the Golden Jubilee diamond is also non-greverest, we would automatically know from the definition of “non-greverest” that we are faced with case 1, the case in which the object is both non-green and non-greverest, and Mount Everest was scaled in 1924. At the moment no one has yet been able to convince the scientific community that he can correctly determine whether the Golden Jubilee diamond is greverest. I am skeptical that anyone will demonstrate to the scientific community that he can correctly determine whether a specific object is greverest; but I would be happy if someone could demonstrate to the scientific community that he can correctly determine whether an object is greverest: that would be a good news for historical studies. The paper continues with two examples, including an example about the predicate "grue". (shrink)

One feature of language is that we are able to make mistakes in our use of language. Amongst other sorts of mistakes, we can misspeak, misspell, missign, or misunderstand. Given this, it seems that our metaphysics of words should be flexible enough to accommodate such mistakes. It has been argued that a nominalist account of words cannot accommodate the phenomenon of misspelling. I sketch a nominalist trope-bundle view of words that can.

In this paper, I aim to discuss what puns, metaphysically, are. I argue that the type-token view of words leads to an indeterminacy problem when we consider puns. I then outline an alternative account of puns, based on recent nominalist views of words, that does not suffer from this indeterminacy.

This study is intended to provide in-depth insights into how design thinking and creativity issues are understood and possibly evolve in the course of design discussions in a company context. For that purpose, we use the seminar transcripts of the Design Thinking Research Symposium 12 (DTRS12) dataset “Tech-centred Design Thinking: Perspectives from a Rising Asia,” which are primarily concerned with how Korean companies implement design thinking and what role designers currently play. We employed a novel method of information processing based (...) on constructed dynamic semantic networks to investigate the seminar discussions according to company representatives and company size. We compared the quantitative dynamics in two seminars: the first involved managerial representatives of four companies, and the second involved specialized designers and management of a design center of single company. On the basis of dynamic semantic networks, we quantified the changes in four semantic measures—abstraction, polysemy, information content, and pairwise word similarity—in chronologically reconstructed individual design-thinking processes. Statistical analyses show that design thinking in the seminar with four companies, exhibits significant differences in the dynamics of abstraction, polysemy, and information content, compared to the seminar with the design center of single company. Both the decrease in polysemy and abstraction and the increase in information content in the individual design-thinking processes in the seminar with four companies indicate that design managers are focused on more concrete design issues, with more information and less ambiguous content to the final design product. By contrast, specialized designers manifest more abstract thinking and appear to exhibit a slightly higher level of divergence in their design processes. The results suggest that design thinking and creativity issues are articulated differently depending on designer roles and the company size. (shrink)

Realism about types is the view that types are abstract and repeatable objects. Although type realists seem to agree that types, unlike properties, are objects in their own right, they argue that there is a metaphysically intimate tie between the existence conditions of types and properties. In particular, most type realists believe that types are, in a certain sense, determined by the properties that underlie them. I argue that this is a mistake, especially for those type realists who believe that (...) social and cultural types such as works of music and fiction or words are artifacts. I offer an alternative version of type realism where social and cultural types are dependent objects that should be understood in analogy with concrete artifacts. (shrink)

In current discussions on the problem of the metaphysical nature of the word, four factions – eliminativism, nominalism, originalism, and the type-token theory – take an active part. For eliminativism, words as separate entities do not exist; they are only a useful cognitive illusion. In the process of communication, competent speakers make sounds and inscriptions through which they are able to infer certain intentional contents of each other’s cognitive states. However, these sounds and inscriptions cannot be regarded as instances of (...) words since they do not possess the phonological and orthographic properties constitutive of words. For nominalism, by contrast, the streams of sounds and ink patterns produced by competent speakers serve as relevant instances of a particular word, or its tokens. What we usually call “words” are collections of such tokens, composed on the basis of similarity relations (phono- logical, orthographic or semantic). For originalism, the streams of sounds and ink patterns created by competent speakers are stages of words, understood as continuants, concrete ob- jects preserving identity over time, individualized by the causal history of their origin. Words are created by competent speakers through the practice of naming and spread through chains of interpersonal contact. The phonological, orthographic and semantic properties possessed by different stages of the same word are generally useless for a proper description of objects such as words. At different times of their existence, words can change any of their properties (pronunciation, spelling, and even reference) while preserving their identity in time. For the type-token theory, words are types, or abstract objects encoding a particular phonographic pattern, which in the process of communication must be instantiated by a competent native speaker by uttering or writing the appropriate token. The type-token theory has several ad- vantages over the views of eliminativism, nominalism and originalism. Firstly, it offers a unified ontology of linguistic structures (since the division into tokens and types extends here to the whole range of linguistic units, including sentences and letters). Secondly, unlike most of its competitors, it is able to present a clear operational criterion for word identity, while being consistent with most of our intuitive notions of intra- and cross-linguistic phenomena (homonymy, synonymy, etc.). (shrink)

In this paper, I develop a theory on which each of a thing’s abundant properties is immanent in that thing. On the version of the theory I will propose, universals are abundant, each instantiated universal is immanent, and each uninstantiated universal is such that it could have been instantiated, in which case it would have been immanent. After setting out the theory, I will defend it from David Lewis’s argument that such a combination of immanence and abundance is absurd. I (...) will then advocate the theory on the grounds that it accomplishes all of Lewis’s “new work” while providing a gain in parsimony and a new account of fine-grained content. I will close with a discussion of how the theory also affords a new reply to two objections to uninstantiated universals: Armstrong’s charge that they are inconsistent with naturalism, and a Benacerraf-Field-style objection about epistemic access. (shrink)

The Millian semantic view of names relies on a metaphysical view of names—often given the label ‘common currency conception’ —on which the names of distinct individuals count as distinct names. While even defenders of the Millian view admit that the CCC ‘does not agree with the most common usage’, I will argue further that the CCC makes names exceptional amongst the class of linguistic expressions: if the CCC is correct, then names must have a sui-generis metaphysical nature, distinct from the (...) metaphysics of every other kind of linguistic expression. Such metaphysical exceptionalism would be justified if the Millian view had a clear, uncontested theoretical advantage over its rivals. However, in the context of a semantic debate about names in which the closest competitors of the Millian view—the Predicate view and Indexicalism—do not result in such exceptionalism, it counts as a strike against the Millian view. (shrink)

Kaplan (1990; 2011) argues that there are no unspoken words. Hawthorne and Lepore (2011) put forward examples that purport to show that there can be such words. Here, I argue that Kaplan is correct, if we grant him a minor variation. While Hawthorne and Lepore might be right that there can be unspoken words, I will argue that they fail to show that there can be uninstantiated words.

Heutige Sprache besteht aus versteinerten Formen, denen zu widersprechen für die meisten Menschen widersinnig erscheint. In diesem Empfinden des Widersinns im Widersprechen manifestiert sich psychischer Widerstand, der überwunden werden muß, indem er für alle, die davon betroffen sind, bewußt gemacht wird. Weil die Bewußtwerdung abgewehrter Inhalte ein Vorgang ist, der im Verlauf psychoanalytischer Behandlung oder Selbstbefragung bzw. Selbstinfragestellung zustande kommt, versuche ich die wesentlichen Ursachen für psychischen Widerstand aufzuzeigen.

Eco/logical R/evolution, is the story of mankind, told with words of a great and wonderful subjective odyssey, the never-ending quest; for objective truths and collective Eudaimonia. The author raises the issues; of political weakness and widespread confusion, about logical analytical errors, of which we find many of in Old Marxist Ideology. As a conscious effort, is thus made, to expel the mental subjugation of Platonic Idealism, away from the clenches Aristotelian Realism, and its bastard offspring; Old Historical Materialism. The book (...) identifies, in the works of Darwin and Marx, a wide range of worrying philosophical incompatibilities, such that are clearly found; in their respective theories and research methodologies. -/- We hereby propose; that a New Marxist Philosophy of Science, stands a probable chance; at unifying the Natural and Social Sciences. As the convergence of truths is manifest, thus, it is mapped out in detail by the author, out of necessity. It invokes, a Marxist Metaphysical Identity, for the sole purpose off; presenting a teleological framework, for New Marxist Theory. -/- NOTE: Reader must look up each word in a dictionary, which they see on both sides of the "/" when found in the middle of a word. (shrink)

It has been a common assumption that words are substances that instantiate or have properties. In this paper, I question the assumption that our ontology of words requires posting substances by outlining a bundle theory of words, wherein words are bundles of various sorts of properties (such as semantic, phonetic, orthographic, and grammatical properties). I argue that this view can better account for certain phenomena than substance theories, is ontologically more parsimonious, and coheres with claims in linguistics.

It has been widely argued that words are analogous to species such that words, like species, are natural kinds. In this paper, I consider the metaphysics of word-kinds. After arguing against an essentialist approach, I argue that word-kinds are homeostatic property clusters, in line with the dominant approach to other biological and psychological kinds.

What are words and how should we individuate them? There are two main answers on the philosophical market. For some, words are bundles of structural-functional features defining a unique performance profile. For others, words are non-eternal continuants individuated by their causal-historical ancestry. These conceptions offer competing views of the nature of words, and it seems natural to assume that at most one of them can capture the essence of wordhood. This paper makes a case for pluralism about wordhood: the view (...) that there is a plurality of acceptable conceptions of the nature of words, none of which is uniquely entitled to inform us as to what wordhood consists in. (shrink)

Abstract artifacts such as musical works and fictional entities are human creations; they are intentional products of our actions and activities. One line of argument against abstract artifacts is that abstract objects are not the kind of objects that can be created. This is so, it is argued, because abstract objects are causally inert. Since creation requires being caused to exist, abstract objects cannot be created. One common way to refute this argument is to reject the causal inefficacy of abstracta. (...) I argue that creationists should rather reject the principle that creation requires causation. Creation, in my view, is a non-causal relation that can be explained using an appropriate notion of ontological dependence. The existence and the creation of abstract artifacts depend on certain individuals with appropriate intentions, along with events of a certain kind that include but are not limited to creations of certain concrete objects. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The idea that two words can be instances of the same word is a central intuition in our conception of language. This fact underlies many of the claims that we make about how we communicate, and how we understand each other. Given this, irrespective of what we think words are, it is common to think that any putative ontology of words, must be able to explain this feature of language. That is, we need to provide criteria of identity for (...) word-types which allow us to individuate words such that it can be the case that two particular word-instances are instances of the same word-type. One solution, recently further developed by Irmak, holds that words are individuated by their history. In this paper, I argue that this view either fails to account for our intuitions about word identity, or is too vague to be a plausible answer to the problem of word individuation. (shrink)

What are words? What makes two token words tokens of the same word-type? Are words abstract entities, or are they (merely) collections of tokens? The ontology of words tries to provide answers to these, and related questions. This article provides an overview of some of the most prominent views proposed in the literature, with a particular focus on the debate between type-realist, nominalist, and eliminativist ontologies of words.

Words are indispensable linguistic tools for beings like us. However, there is not much philosophical work done about what words really are. In this paper, I develop a new ontology for words. I argue that words are abstract artifacts that are created to fulfill various kinds of purposes, and words are abstract in the sense that they are not located in space but they have a beginning and may have an end in time given that certain conditions are met. What (...) follows from this two-fold argument is that words, from an ontological point of view, are more like musical works, fictional characters or computer programs, than numbers or sets. (shrink)

Existing metasemantic projects presuppose that word- (or sentence-) types are part of the non-semantic base. We propose a new strategy: an endogenous account of word types, that is, one where word types are fixed as part of the metasemantics. On this view, it is the conventions of truthfulness and trust that ground not only the meaning of the words (meaning by convention) but also what the word type is of each particular token utterance (words by convention). The same treatment extends (...) to identifying the populations through which the conventions prevail. We consider whether this proposal leads to new underdetermination challenges for metasemantics, and make a case that it does not. (shrink)

The natural name theory, recently discussed by Johnson (2018), is proposed as an explanation of pure quotation where the quoted term(s) refers to a linguistic object such as in the sentence ‘In the above, ‘bank’ is ambiguous’. After outlining the theory, I raise a problem for the natural name theory. I argue that positing a resemblance relation between the name and the linguistic object it names does not allow us to rule out cases where the natural name fails to resemble (...) the linguistic object it names. I argue that to avoid this problem, we can combine the natural name theory with a type-realist metaphysics of language, and hold that the name is natural because the name is an instance of the kind that it names. I conclude by reflecting on the importance of the metaphysics of language for questions in the philosophy of language. (shrink)

У статті описано джерела реєстру російсько-українського академічного словника за редакцією А. Кримського та С. Єфремова, а також інших російсько-українських словників 20-х рр. ХХ ст. Реєстри тогочасних перекладних словників базувалися переважно на реєстрах перекладних словників, виданих раніше, частково залучалися словники інших типів, зокрема термінологічні, а також матеріали преси.

The words we call slurs are just plain vanilla descriptions like ‘cowboy’ and ‘coat hanger’. They don't semantically convey any disparagement of their referents, whether as content, conventional implicature, presupposition, “coloring” or mode of presentation. What distinguishes 'kraut' and 'German' is metadata rather than meaning: the former is the conventional description for Germans among Germanophobes when they are speaking in that capacity, in the same way 'mad' is the conventional expression that some teenagers use as an intensifier when they’re emphasizing (...) that social identity. That is, racists don’t use slurs because they’re derogatory; slurs are derogatory because they’re the words that racists use. To use a slur is to exploit the Maxim of Manner (or Levinson’s M-Principle) to signal one’s affiliation with a group that has a disparaging attitude towards the slur’s referent. This account is sufficient to explain all the familiar properties of slurs, such as their speaker orientation and “nondetachability,” with no need of additional linguistic mechanisms. It also explains some features of slurs that are rarely if ever explored; for example the variation in tone and strength among the different slurs for a particular group, the existence of words we count as slurs, such as 'redskin', which almost all of their users consider to be respectful, and the curious absence in Standard English of any commonly used slurs—by which I mean words used to express a negative attitude toward an entire group—for Muslims and women. (shrink)

Статтю присвячено актуалізації батярського жаргону, одному із різновидів розмовного мовлення Львова в міжвоєнний період. Проаналізовано основні групи лексики, зафіксовані в романах Юрія Винничука «Цензор снів» (2013) і «Танґо смерті» (2016). Визначено функції львівського лексикону в художніх текстах, схарактеризовано образ батяра. Особливу увагу приділено вивченню жаргону цієї соціальної групи як мовно-психологічної характеристики персонажів.

У статті розглянуто семантичні процеси в економічній лексиці української мови, що відбуваються під впливом важливих подій у житті суспільства кінця XX – початку XXI ст. Здійснено порівняльний аналіз словникових статей лексем економічної сфери в українських лексикографічних працях тлумачного типу радянського та пострадянського періодів, які фіксують зміни в їхній семантиці. З’ясовано, що слова позбуваються ідеологічної конотації, набутої в умовах функціонування в радянському тоталітарному дискурсі.

У статті проаналізовано лексемний і семний склад мікрополя «повага», а також його системну організацію в українській мові. Компоненти значення, що функціонують у мікрополі, відбиваають семантику поваги, пошани щодо об’єкта почуття, яким для лексико-семантичного поля «патріотизм» виступають Батьківщина, власний народ, його закони, традиції, історія тощо.

У статті розглянуто проблемні питання дериваційних відношень, напрямів морфонологічних трансформацій, складні процеси, пов’язані з використанням варіантних формантів та з утвердженням національної ідентичності в словотвірній морфонології девербативів і відповідність їх словотвірним нормам української літературної мови, окреслено концептуальні засади морфонологічного аналізу девербативів, проаналізовано ефективні й специфічні методи й прийоми дослідження віддієслівних іменників у словотвірно-морфонологічному аспекті та визначено найбільш дієві методики аналізу морфонологічних явищ.

У статті описано підходи до написання словників у перші десятиліття ХХ ст. Розглянуто концепцію і принципи укладання російсько-українського академічного словника. Проаналізовано реалізацію концепції російсько-українського академічного словника як лексикографічної праці, що поєднує риси перекладного, тлумачного, синонімічного та фразеологічного словників.

У статті проаналізовано синкретичні семантико-синтаксичні відношення у структурі складнопідрядних займенниково-співвідносних речень симетричного типу, з’ясовано причини, що впливають на формування цих синкретичних відношень.

Статтю присвячено висвітленню особливостей деідеологізації лексем на позначення мистецьких напрямів і течій у сучасних українських словниках тлумачного типу, що відбувається під впливом змін у житті українського суспільства наприкінці XX – на початку XXI ст. Дослідження здійснено на основі порівняльного аналізу тлумачень слів у лексикографічних працях радянського і пострадянського періодів. Виявлено приклади неповної деідеологізації лексичних одиниць зазначеної тематичної групи.

Primary and secondary processes are the foundational axes of the Freudian mental apparatus: one horizontally as a tendency to associate, the primary process, and one vertically as the ability for perspective taking, the secondary process. Primary process mentation is not only supposed to be dominant in the unconscious but also, for example, in dreams. The present study tests the hypothesis that the mental activity during REM-sleep has more characteristics of the primary process, while during non-REM-sleep more secondary process operations take (...) place. Because the solving of a rebus requires the ability to non-contexually condensate the literal reading of single stimuli into a new one, rebus solving is a primary process operation by excellence. In a replication of the dream-rebus study of Shevrin and Fisher (1967), a rebus, which consisted of an image of a comb (German: “Kamm”) and an image of a raft (German: “Floß”), resulting in the German rebus word “kampflos” (Engl.: without a struggle), was flashed subliminally (at 1 ms) to 20 participants before going to sleep. Upon consecutive awakenings participants were asked for a dream report, free associations and an image description. Based on objective association norms, there were significantly more conceptual associations referring to Kamm and Floß indexing secondary process mentation when subjects were awakened from non-REM sleep as compared to REM-awakenings. There were not significantly more rebus associations referring to kampflos indexing primary process mentation when awakened from REM-sleep as compared to non-REM awakenings. However, when the associations were scored on the basis of each subject’s individual norms, there was a rebus effect with more idiosyncratic rebus associations in awakenings after REM than after non-REM-sleep. Our results support the general idea that REM-sleep is characterized by primary process thinking, while non-REM-sleep mentation follows the rules of the secondary process. (shrink)

In this paper, I explore two contrasting conceptions of the social character of language. The first takes language to be grounded in social convention. The second, famously developed by Donald Davidson, takes language to be grounded in a social relation called triangulation. I aim both to clarify and to evaluate these two conceptions of language. First, I propose that Davidson’s triangulation-based story can be understood as the result of relaxing core features of conventionalism pertaining to both common-interest and diachronic stability—specifically, (...) Davidson does not require uses of language to be self-perpetuating, in the way required by conventionalism, in order to be bona fide components of linguistic systems. Second, I argue that Davidson’s objections to conventionalism from language innovation and language variation fail, and that certain kinds of negative data in language use require an appeal to diachronic social relations. However, I also argue that recent work on communication in the a.. (shrink)

According to Originalism, word types are non-eternal continuants which are individuated by their causal-historical lineage and have a unique possible time of origination. This view collides with the intuition that individual words can be added to the lexicon of a language at different times, and generates other problematic consequences. The paper shows that such undesired results can be accommodated without abandoning Originalism.

Clearly neither I nor anyone will ever read any substantial part of this massive tome so I will discuss the one article that interests me most and which I think provides the framework necessary for the understanding of all the rest. I refer to the one on Ludwig Wittgenstein (W). Even were I to try to discuss others, we would not get past the first page as all the issues here arise immediately in any discussion of behavior. The differentiation of (...) pragmatics and semantics is largely meaningless. It is defensible that one might subtitle this work ‘Developments of Wittgenstein’s Contextualism’, but of course this term has inevitably been corrupted by philosophers. One might then say that pragmatics and semantics are parts of or coextensive with epistemology and ontology and the descriptive psychology of higher order thought (Searle’s Logical Structure of Rationality) or that they describe how we use noises in specific contexts to give them meaning --i.e., a true or false (propositional) use which Searle calls their Conditions of Satisfaction. Adding the Wittgenstein/Searle work to modern research on thinking provides a framework for pragmatics, semantics and all other human behavior. -/- Those wishing a comprehensive up to date framework for human behavior from the modern two systems view may consult my article The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language as Revealed in Wittgenstein and Searle 59p(2016). For all my articles on Wittgenstein and Searle see my e-book ‘The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language in Wittgenstein and Searle 367p (2016). Those interested in all my writings in their most recent versions may consult my e-book Philosophy, Human Nature and the Collapse of Civilization - Articles and Reviews 2006-2016’ 662p (2016). -/- All of my papers and books have now been published in revised versions both in ebooks and in printed books. -/- Talking Monkeys: Philosophy, Psychology, Science, Religion and Politics on a Doomed Planet - Articles and Reviews 2006-2017 (2017) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071HVC7YP. -/- The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language in Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle--Articles and Reviews 2006-2016 (2017) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B071P1RP1B. -/- Suicidal Utopian Delusions in the 21st century: Philosophy, Human Nature and the Collapse of Civilization - Articles and Reviews 2006-2017 (2017) https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0711R5LGX -/- . (shrink)

Clearly neither I nor anyone will ever read any substantial part of this massive tome so I will discuss the one article that interests me most and which I think provides the framework necessary for the understanding of all the rest. I refer to the one on Ludwig Wittgenstein (W). Even were I to try to discuss others, we would not get past the first page as all the issues here arise immediately in any discussion of behavior. The differentiation of (...) pragmatics and semantics is largely meaningless. It is defensible that one might subtitle this work ‘Developments of Wittgenstein’s Contextualism’, but of course this term has inevitably been corrupted by philosophers. One might then say that pragmatics and semantics are parts of or coextensive with epistemology and ontology and the descriptive psychology of higher order thought (Searle’s Logical Structure of Rationality) or that they describe how we use noises in specific contexts to give them meaning --i.e., a true or false (propositional) use which Searle calls their Conditions of Satisfaction. Adding the Wittgenstein/Searle work to modern research on thinking provides a framework for pragmatics, semantics and all other human behavior. -/- Those wishing a comprehensive up to date framework for human behavior from the modern two systems view may consult my book ‘The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language in Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle’ 2nd ed (2019). Those interested in more of my writings may see ‘Talking Monkeys--Philosophy, Psychology, Science, Religion and Politics on a Doomed Planet--Articles and Reviews 2006-2019 3rd ed (2019), The Logical Structure of Human Behavior (2019), and Suicidal Utopian Delusions in the 21st Century 4th ed (2019). (shrink)

Images, or icons, have been made the subject of a ‘turn’. But no new epoch under its sign is looming. The image is just one medium among others. The best we can do is to face what it may and what it may not achieve. Its main competitor is the word – though there is a field of transition between both. Words and numbers surpass the image when one needs to refer to something that cannot be seen – this holds (...) for ‘radioactivity’ just as much as for ‘responsibility’. To unambiguously show a categorial relation like causality or a logical feature like negation in an image borders on the impossible. (The aspiration to symbolize or manifest the invisible, though, has long inspired artistic images.) Pictures are accessible to the illiterate; while a language must be learned, an image seems to admit everyone. Yet that is in part an illusion. Obviously, it is not enough to see an image. To understand it, however, often a number of things must have been learnt in the first place, too. (shrink)

(English then french abstract) -/- This article, which can be read by non-psychoanalysts, intends to browse in four stages through the issue offered to our thinking : two (odd-numbered) stages analyzing the argument that provides its context, and two (even-numbered) of propositions presenting our views on what could be the content of the analytic discourse in the coming years. After this introduction, a first reading will point by point but informally review the argument of J.-P. Journet by showing that each (...) of its clauses may generate a “bifurcated” comment able to serve or go against the analytic discourse. Hence the interest of the “differential diagnosis” mentioned in our title, which makes glimpse the traps that the homonymy may set to this speech. Then, to prepare a second scan which sticks neither to the analytical doxa, nor to the even authoritative opinions of our tenors and seniors, it will be proposed two attempts at redefinitions (“apophatic” and “recursive”) of what psychoanalysis is, as well as methodological tools operating downstream from these redefinitions to thwart the obstacles of “external” and “internal” homonymy (starting from a syllogism which can make consensus).The third stage will precisely be made of our second scan of the issue, whose elements will be reviewed and analyzed more methodically :“external differential diagnosis” between the analytic discourse and psychology, philosophy, sociology, and modern science, and “internal differential diagnosis” on the entanglement between theoretical advances of psychoanalysts and the repeated survival of fantasmatic elements...Finally, a fourth part will present propositions and perspectives resulting from these analysis (principle of economy as to the source of psychoanalytical theorizations; dialogue with the other fields, but without compromising; specific relations with the discourse of science), all this leading to an invitation, beyond disputes, to renew the content of the analytic discourse on some points... -/- --------------------------------------------------------------------- -/- Cet article, qui se veut lisible aux non-analystes, se propose de parcourir en quatre temps la problématique offerte à notre réflexion : deux temps (de rang impair) d'analyse de l'argument qui en fournit le contexte, et deux (de rang pair) de propositions présentant nos vues sur ce que pourrait être la teneur du discours analytique dans les prochaines années. Après cette introduction, un premier parcours réexaminera point par point mais informellement l'argument de J.-P. Journet en montrant que chacune de ses propositions peut donner lieu à un commentaire “bifide” à même de servir ou de desservir le discours analytique. D'où l'intérêt du “diagnostic différentiel” évoqué dans notre titre, qui fait entrevoir les pièges que l'homonymie peut tendre à ce discours.Puis, pour préparer un second balayage qui ne s'en tienne ni à la doxa analytique, ni aux opinions même autorisées de nos ténors et seniors, il sera proposé deux tentatives de redéfinitions (“apophatique” et “récursive”) de ce qu'est l'analyse, ainsi que des outils méthodologiques fonctionnant en aval de ces redéfinitions pour déjouer les embûches de l'homonymie “externe” et “interne” (à partir d'un syllogisme pouvant faire consensus). Le troisième temps sera fait justement de ce second balayage de la problématique, dont les éléments seront reconsidérés et analysés plus méthodiquement : “diagnostic différentiel externe” entre le discours analytique et les discours psychologique, philosophique, sociologique et celui de la science moderne ; et “diagnostic différentiel interne” portant sur l'intrication entre avancées théoriques des analystes et survivance à répétition d'éléments fantasmatiques...Enfin une quatrième partie exposera propositions et perspectives résultant de ces analyses (principe d'économie quant à la source des théorisations analytiques ; dialogue avec les autres champs, mais sans compromissions ; relations spécifiques avec le discours de la science), l'ensemble débouchant sur une invitation, au delà des différends, à renouveler sur certains points la teneur du discours analytique... (shrink)

Formal semantic analyses often take words to be minimal building blocks for the purposes of compositionality. But various recent theories of morphology and syntax have converged on the view that there is no demarcation line corresponding to the word level. The same conclusion has emerged from the compositional semantics of superlatives. In the spirit of extending compositionality below the word level, this paper explores how a small set of particles (Japanese KA and MO, Chinese DOU, and Hungarian VALA/VAGY, MIND, and (...) IS) form quantifier words and serve as connectives, additive and scalar particles, question markers, and existential verbs. The main question is whether the meanings of these particles across the varied environments are highly regular, or they are lexicalized with a variety of different meanings that bear a family resemblance. This paper does not reach definitive conclusions, but it raises analytical possibilities using Boolean semantics and the semantics of alternatives. It also draws attention to systematic similarities and some differences between MO and DOU that have not been studied in the literature. (shrink)

"Language and its Public Features: Reorganizing the Trivium in Locke's Essay and Port-Royal Logic" The new theory of language in the 17th century coincides with the end the traditional order of disciplines in the trivium (grammar, logic and rhetoric), which in the mediaeval times provided a comprehensive view of the problems of discourse. The article focuses on some key passages in Port-Royal Logic and Locke's Essay that provide us with a typical early modern scheme of linguistic representation, characterised by heavily (...) emphasized dualism of ideas and words. Since ideas are also the meanings of words and are ontologically essentially private, one can raise the question, where in this analysis of language is it even possible to locate its public features. The article tries to show that private language is not only possible for Locke and the Port-Royalists, but that it is even a necessary and primary character of language. Language becomes a public medium of communication only on the junctures of private meanings constituted by the “common use” of words. The article then focuses on almost complete marginalisation in the two works of the theory of public speech. Rhetoric, in the 17th century often reduced to mere eloquence, has no place in philosophy, and the duties of making speeches persuasive are taken over by reason alone. To show how the domains of jurisdiction of the trivial disciplines had been transformed in the linguistic theories proposed by the Port-Royal Logic and Locke, one can construct a hypothetical early modern trivium in the light of the following order: idea – word – figure, or, logic – grammar – rhetoric. Rhetoric is found to have kept its structural place only to be singled out as dangerous. (shrink)

During much of the past century, it was widely believed that phonemes--the human speech sounds that constitute words--have no inherent semantic meaning, and that the relationship between a combination of phonemes (a word) and its referent is simply arbitrary. Although recent work has challenged this picture by revealing psychological associations between certain phonemes and particular semantic contents, the precise mechanisms underlying these associations have not been fully elucidated. Here we provide novel evidence that certain phonemes have an inherent, non-arbitrary emotional (...) quality. Moreover, we show that the perceived emotional valence of certain phoneme combinations depends on a specific acoustic feature--namely, the dynamic shift within the phonemes' first two frequency components. These data suggest a phoneme-relevant acoustic property influencing the communication of emotion in humans, and provide further evidence against previously held assumptions regarding the structure of human language. This finding has potential applications for a variety of social, educational, clinical, and marketing contexts. (shrink)

This chapter develops a semantics for 'reifying terms' of the sort 'the proposition that S', 'the fact that S', 'the property of being P', 'the number eight', 'the concept horse', 'the truth value true', 'the kind humane being'. This semantics is developed within the broader perspective of the ontology of natural language involving abstract objects only at its periphery, not its core.

The paper studies Heidegger's reading of the poet Stefan George (1868-1933), particularly of his poem "Das Wort" (1928), in the context of Heidegger's narrative of the history of metaphysics. Heidegger reads George's poem as expressing certain experiences with language: first, the constitutive role of language, of naming and discursive determination, in granting things stable identities; second, the unnameable and indeterminable character of language itself as a constitutive process and the concomitant insight into the human being's dependency on language and her (...) incapacity to master in subjectively. Heidegger characterizes this experience as "transitional" (übergänglich). It is shown that in Heidegger's historical narrative, this places George's poem in the ongoing transition (Übergang) from the Hegelian and Nietzschean end of metaphysics to a forthcoming "other beginning" of thinking. (shrink)

Under what conditions are two utterances utterances of the same word? What are words? That these questions have not received much attention is rather surprising: after all, philosophers and linguists frequently appeal to considerations about word and sentence identity in connection with a variety of puzzles and problems that are foundational to the very subject matter of philosophy of language and linguistics.1 Kaplan’s attention to words is thus to be applauded. And there is no doubt that his discussion contains many (...) useful insights. Nevertheless, we find his picture deeply flawed for a variety of crosscutting reasons. Our aim in this paper is to further advance an understanding of the nature of words, both by remedying the problems with Kaplan’s account, and also by achieving a suitable perspective on what the metaphysical investigation of word identity can hope to achieve. Our discussion divides into four parts. In Part One, we examine and critique Kaplan’s discussion of a contrast integral to his own account: that between the type-token and the stage-continuant conceptions of words. In Part Two, we present three constraints on any account of words and two further themes in Kaplan’s discussion central to his conception of words – the role of repetition and the constitutive authority of intentions. While these ideas have laudable motivations, we argue they are far from the best way of making good on the insights that drive them. The final two sections take a skeptical turn. In Part Three, we express doubt about Kaplan’s presumption of the importance of what he calls ‘common currency names’, thus raising a suspicion that he may be in pursuit of chimera. Finally, in Part Four, we express pessimism about whether interesting answers to question above will be forthcoming, and suggest that the legitimacy of our word ontology need not depend on the availability of such answers. Along the way, we tease apart a number of metaphysical questions in the vicinity of the topic of word individuation – questions that are often not disentangled – and consider how the discussion of the previous parts bears on them.. (shrink)

My aim in this paper is to discuss a metaphysical framework within which to understand “standard linguistic entities” (SLEs), such as words, sentences, phonemes, and other entities routinely employed in linguistic theory. In doing so, I aim to defuse certain kinds of skepticism, challenge convention-based accounts of SLEs, and present a series of distinctions for better understanding what the various accounts of SLEs do and do not accomplish.

Chomsky and others have denied the relevance of external linguistic entities, such as E-languages, to linguistic explanation, and have questioned their coherence altogether. I discuss a new approach to understanding the nature of linguistic entities, focusing in particular on making sense of the varieties of kinds of “words” that are employed in linguistic theorizing. This treatment of linguistic entities in general is applied to constructing an understanding of external linguistic entities.

Heidegger has created a new philosophical genre: poetric and philosophical thought by his paters on Hölderlin and other poets. Philosophy and poetry a two tops of human thought, each of which can be seen from the other one. The book contains essays in that genre and tradition.

A picture of the world as chiefly one of discrete objects, distributed in space and time, has sometimes seemed compelling. It is however one of the main targets of Henry Laycock's book; for it is seriously incomplete. The picture, he argues, leaves no space for "stuff" like air and water. With discrete objects, we may always ask "how many?," but with stuff the question has to be "how much?" Laycock's fascinating exploration also addresses key logical and linguistic questions about the (...) way we categorize the many and the much. (shrink)

Contextual vocabulary acquisition (CVA) is the deliberate acquisition of a meaning for a word in a text by reasoning from context, where “context” includes: (1) the reader’s “internalization” of the surrounding text, i.e., the reader’s “mental model” of the word’s “textual context” (hereafter, “co-text” [3]) integrated with (2) the reader’s prior knowledge (PK), but it excludes (3) external sources such as dictionaries or people. CVA is what you do when you come across an unfamiliar word in your reading, realize that (...) you don’t know what it means, decide that you need to know what it means in order to understand the passage, but there is no one around to ask, and it is not in the dictionary (or you are too lazy to look it up). In such a case, you can try to figure out its meaning “from context”, i.e., from clues in the co-text together with your prior knowledge. Our computational theory of CVA—implemented in a the SNePS knowledge representation and reasoning system [28]—begins with a stored knowledge base containing SNePS representations of relevant PK, inputs SNePS representations of a passage containing an unfamiliar word, and draws inferences from these two (integrated) information sources. When asked to define the word, definition algorithms deductively search the resulting network for information of the sort that might be found in a dictionary definition, outputting a definition frame whose slots are the kinds of features that a definition might contain (e.g., class membership, properties, actions, spatio-temporal information, etc.) and whose slot-fillers contain information gleaned from the network [6–8,20,23,24]. We are investigating ways to make our system more robust, to embed it in a naturallanguage-processing system, and to incorporate morphological information. Our research group, including reading educators, is also applying our methods to the develop-. (shrink)

Provides an account of how necessary subjective syntactic investments on the part of speakers affect the semantic contents of their words and the possibilities for their thought-contents.

Sir John Lyons’s Linguistic Semantics: An Introduction (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 1995) is a tolerable addition to the list of half a dozen or so impressive titles he has produced on linguistic subjects over the years. This book was initially planned to be a second edition of his Language, Meaning and Context (Lyons, 1981). However, in the end it turned out to be a successor and replacement. For it is, in the author’s words, a very different book compared to (...) the 1981 volume: it is much longer, treats topics missing in the earlier volume, and is written in a different style. (shrink)