The author argues that the so-called “basic emotions”, such as happiness, fear or anger, are in fact cultural artifacts of the English language, just as the Ilongot concept of liget, or the Ifaluk concept of song, are the cultural artifacts of Ilongot and Ifaluk. It is therefore as inappropriate to talk about human emotions in general in terms of happiness, fear, or anger as it would be to talk about them in terms of liget or song. However, this does not (...) mean that we cannot penetrate into the emotional world of speakers of languages other than our own. Nor does it mean that there cannot be any universal human emotions. Universality of emotions is an open issue which requires further investigation. For this further investigation to be fully productive, it has to be undertaken from a universal, language and culture-independent perspective; and it has to be carried out in a universalist framework that is language and culture-independent. The author proposes for this purpose the “natural semantic metalanguage” based on universal (or near-universal) semantic primitives (or near-primitives), developed over two decades by herself and colleagues, and she argues that the use of this metalanguage facilitates such a perspective and offers such a framework. (shrink)

This article demonstrates that emotion concepts—including the so‐called basic ones, such as anger or sadness—can be defined in terms of universal semantic primitives such as “good”, “bad”, “do”, “happen”, “know”, and “want”, in terms of which all areas of meaning, in all languages, can be rigorously and revealingly portrayed.The definitions proposed here take the form of certain prototypical scripts or scenarios, formulated in terms of thoughts, wants, and feelings. These scripts, however, can be seen as formulas providing rigorous specifications of (...) necessary and sufficient conditions (not for emotions as such, but for emotion concepts), and they do not support the idea that boundaries between emotion concepts are “fuzzy.” On the contrary, the small set of universal semantic primitives employed here (which has emerged from two decades of empirical investigations by the author and colleagues) demonstrates that even apparent synonyms such as sad and unhappy embody different—and fully specifiable—conceptual structures. (shrink)

La genèse des couleurs de base fournit des indications pour mieux comprendre l’émergence des termes spatiaux. Les deux modes de formation lexicale interne à l’œuvre à l’intérieur du système de la langue peuvent être opposés à la formation lexicale externe qui rattache directement les mots à des notions extralinguistiques de première importance dans la communauté des locuteurs. Après une discussion du scénario avancé par Levinson et Meira pour la genèse des termes spatiaux, je présente mon propre point de vue sur (...) cette question. Selon cette proposition, la dichotomie entre CONTROL et LOC constitue la première étape dans l’émergence des adpositions spatiales. Comme illustré par la préposition œt du vieil anglais, cette partie du système évolue essentiellement sous l’effet de la formation lexicale interne par division. Concernant le système spatial dynamique, différents niveaux de spécification peuvent être observés selon les langues et ceci suggère un mécanisme de formation lexicale externe. Trois modes de développement des mots sont mis en évidence dans la section suivante, dont deux —débutant au milieu ou au bas de la hiérarchie des mots ou concepts— relèvent clairement de la formation lexicale externe. Dans la dernière section de l’article, j’envisage comment l’acquisition du langage pourrait fournir des indices sur le développement des termes spatiaux. (shrink)

Psychology suffers from the absence of mathematically-formalized primitives. As a result, conceptual and quantitative studies lack an ontological basis that would situate them in the company of natural sciences. The article addresses this problem by describing a minimal psychic structure, expressed in the algebra of quantum theory. The structure is demarcated into categories of emotion and color, renowned as elementary psychological phenomena. This is achieved by means of quantum-theoretic qubit state space, isomorphic to emotion and color experiences both in meaning (...) and math. In particular, colors are mapped to the qubit states through geometric affinity between the HSL-RGB color solids and the Bloch sphere, widely used in physics. The resulting correspondence aligns with the recent model of subjective experience, producing a unified spherical map of emotions and colors. This structure is identified as a semantic atom of natural thinking—a unit of affectively-colored personal meaning, involved in elementary acts of a binary decision. The model contributes to finding a unified ontology of both inert and living Nature, bridging previously disconnected fields of research. In particular, it enables theory-based coordination of emotion, decision, and cybernetic sciences, needed to achieve new levels of practical impact. (shrink)

Despite the moral gravity and far-reaching consequences of ethical judgment, evidence shows that such judgment is surprisingly malleable, prone to bias, informed by intuition and implicit associations, and swayed by mere circumstance. In this vein, this research examines how mere colors featured in logos can bias consumers’ ethical judgments about a retailer. Exposure to a logo featuring an eco-friendly color makes an ethically ambiguous practice seem more ethical; however, exposure to a logo featuring a non-eco-friendly color makes the same practice (...) seem less ethical. This effect is due to the embodied meaning of color, not referential meanings associated with the names of colors, and it is mediated by perceptions of a retailer’s eco-friendliness. Furthermore, although the word “green” appears to influence ethical ratings of retail practices more than the word “blue,” visual exposure to either color evokes similar perceptions of eco-friendliness and influences ethical judgments. Study 2c assesses and rules out alternative explanations for this effect. Critically, an eco-friendly color can skew judgments even when the practices judged are not ethically ambiguous. Individual differences in ethical sensitivity moderate the observed effect, such that individuals who are less ethically sensitive are less influenced by color. The article concludes with a discussion on how logo colors shape consumers’ perceptions of retailer ethicality. (shrink)

These studies examined naming and free-sorting behavior by informants speaking a wide range of languages, from both industrialized and traditional cultures. Groups of informants, whose color vocabularies varied from 5 to 12 basic terms, were given an unconstrained color grouping task to investigate whether there are systematic differences between cultures in grouping behavior that mirror linguistic differences and, if there are not, what underlying principles might explain any universal tendencies. Despite large differences in color vocabulary, there were substantial similarities in (...) grouping behavior across language groups, and substantial within-language variation across informants. It seems that all informants group stimuli based on some criterion of perceptual similarity, but those with large color vocabularies are more likely to group stimuli in line with their basic color terms. The data are best accounted for by a hybrid system that combines a universal principle of grouping by similarity with culture-specific category salience. (shrink)

The chapter argues from an ethology-inspired internalist perspective that ‘colour’ is not a homogeneous and autonomous attribute, but rather plays different roles in different conceptual forms underlying perception. It discusses empirical and theoretical evidence that indicates that core assumptions underlying orthodox conceptions are grossly inadequate. The assumptions pertain to the idea that colour is a kind of autonomous and unitary attribute. It is regarded as unitary or homogeneous by assuming that its core properties do not depend on the type of (...) ‘perceptual object’ to which it pertains and that‘colour per se’ constitutes a natural attribute in the functional architecture of the perceptual system. It is regarded as autonomous by assuming that it can be studied in isolation of other perceptual attributes. More generally, the chapter argues on the bases of corresponding empirical and theoretical evidence that perception cannot be understood as the ‘recovery’ of physical world structure from sensory structure by input-based computational processes. Rather, the sensory input serves as a kind of sign for biologically relevant aspects of the external world that activates biologically given conceptual forms with their internal parameters. Although the sensory input is a causally necessary requirement for the activation of conceptual forms, the perceptual computations triggered are under the control of an internal programme based on a set of conceptual forms. (shrink)

This study contains a brief overview and comments on some basic texts on the semiotics and semantics of colour. It presents my view on the basic semiotic status of colour as a communication system and on the grammar features of colour language.

The chapter presents a new and complex approach to colors in the Bible. ‎The demonstration of the method requires defining the distinction between verbal and visual color as feasible sign systems. No such distinction has been made up to now. This method serves one major goal: a better understanding of ‎biblical texts originally given in Hebrew, with a focus on hermeneutics. A subsidiary ‎aim is the disclosure of the various structures of color presence in biblical ‎texts. This also involves a (...) detailed semiotics of color, including a complex ‎method based on both the achievements of other scholars and a specific ‎proposal to treat colors as a language, as a sign system. The semiotics of ‎color in the Bible includes four principal areas: color as a sign in general, ‎color semiotics in the Bible and their specificities in both Hebrew and ‎translations in different languages. As a case study, the article focuses on ‎one verse, Song 1:5, treated as a “semiotic iceberg,” i.e., a structure with a ‎visible semantic level supported by “submerged” or less apparent ones. Presenting this method cannot be short and simple because, on the one hand, ‎it is complex, holistic and interdisciplinary, and on the other, there are many ‎novelties in the analysis, including new terms and hypotheses that we must ‎connect with existing terminology in color research. As such, we provide ‎clarification for a number of terms, such as verbal and visual colors as signs, ‎color language and color speech, semio-osmosis, color as a cultural unit, the ‎inner form of the word, mega-color, basic color terms, prototype ‎Terms, rivals for prototypes and basic features of prototypes ‎‎.‎. (shrink)

This paper examines different translations of the Bible from Hebrew, a Semitic language, into Indo-European languages, using the methodology of root semantics and focusing on the Hebrew terms translated into English as “window”. Analysing the semantics of the roots of the Hebrew terms, we discover that in addition to the concept of “window” as an opening in a wall, they also have varying significations of whiteness, light, prophecy, purity, judgment, cleansing, and blessing. All the Hebrew terms are traversed by the (...) idea of light and purity, and also display different transformations of the idea of light, meanings which are lost in translation into Indo-European languages. The theoretical implication is that there are in Biblical Hebrew meanings that never pass to the Indo-European translations, because the Hebrew language is the vehicle of a worldview totally different from that of the Indo-European languages. (shrink)