Charles Travis
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- September 2008
- ISBN:
- 9780199230334
- eISBN:
- 9780191710605
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199230334.001.0001
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Philosophy of Language
This book presents a series of chapters which develops the author's distinctive view of the relation of thought to language. The key idea is ‘occasion-sensitivity’: what it is for words to express a ...
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This book presents a series of chapters which develops the author's distinctive view of the relation of thought to language. The key idea is ‘occasion-sensitivity’: what it is for words to express a given concept is for them to be apt for contributing to any of many different conditions of correctness (notably truth conditions). Since words mean what they do by expressing a given concept, it follows that meaning does not determine truth conditions. This view ties thoughts less tightly to the linguistic forms which express them than traditional views of the matter, and in two directions: a given linguistic form, meaning fixed, may express an indefinite variety of thoughts; one thought can be expressed in an indefinite number of syntactically and semantically distinct ways. The book highlights the importance of this view for linguistic theory, and shows how it gives new form to a variety of traditional philosophical problems.Less
This book presents a series of chapters which develops the author's distinctive view of the relation of thought to language. The key idea is ‘occasion-sensitivity’: what it is for words to express a given concept is for them to be apt for contributing to any of many different conditions of correctness (notably truth conditions). Since words mean what they do by expressing a given concept, it follows that meaning does not determine truth conditions. This view ties thoughts less tightly to the linguistic forms which express them than traditional views of the matter, and in two directions: a given linguistic form, meaning fixed, may express an indefinite variety of thoughts; one thought can be expressed in an indefinite number of syntactically and semantically distinct ways. The book highlights the importance of this view for linguistic theory, and shows how it gives new form to a variety of traditional philosophical problems.
Eric Reuland
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- May 2010
- ISBN:
- 9780199545872
- eISBN:
- 9780191720369
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199545872.003.0011
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Sociolinguistics / Anthropological Linguistics, Psycholinguistics / Neurolinguistics / Cognitive Linguistics
This chapter argues that it is ‘too simplistic’ to view language as primarily a symbolic system used for communication. This view leads to an interpretation of the archeological record that is ‘too ...
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This chapter argues that it is ‘too simplistic’ to view language as primarily a symbolic system used for communication. This view leads to an interpretation of the archeological record that is ‘too naïve’. Central to this argument is the assumption that natural language is a computational system by which linguistic form and semantic interpretation are mapped systematically onto each other. The mapping is based on an inventory of lexical items and a combinatory system that includes the process known as ‘recursion’ which, roughly, has the capacity to form infinitely long sentences by embedding phrases within phrases. The introduction of this process altered the nature of linguistic signs, severing the direct connection between form and interpretation. This gave rise to desymbolization, which is the ‘most characteristic’ property of language. If this view is correct, evidence of symbolic activity by itself would not be a proper diagnostic of the presence of language.Less
This chapter argues that it is ‘too simplistic’ to view language as primarily a symbolic system used for communication. This view leads to an interpretation of the archeological record that is ‘too naïve’. Central to this argument is the assumption that natural language is a computational system by which linguistic form and semantic interpretation are mapped systematically onto each other. The mapping is based on an inventory of lexical items and a combinatory system that includes the process known as ‘recursion’ which, roughly, has the capacity to form infinitely long sentences by embedding phrases within phrases. The introduction of this process altered the nature of linguistic signs, severing the direct connection between form and interpretation. This gave rise to desymbolization, which is the ‘most characteristic’ property of language. If this view is correct, evidence of symbolic activity by itself would not be a proper diagnostic of the presence of language.
John Malcolm
- Published in print:
- 1991
- Published Online:
- October 2011
- ISBN:
- 9780198239062
- eISBN:
- 9780191679827
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198239062.003.0009
- Subject:
- Philosophy, Ancient Philosophy
Having offered an affirmative answer to the question as to whether the Form is, for Plato, an F thing, this chapter examines the doctrine that Plato became committed to the existence of such entities ...
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Having offered an affirmative answer to the question as to whether the Form is, for Plato, an F thing, this chapter examines the doctrine that Plato became committed to the existence of such entities because of logico-linguistic error, for example, by confusing identifying, denoting, or properly naming with describing, or predicating, such as when one assumes that such expressions as ‘to F’ (‘the F’) or ‘ho esti F’ (‘that which is F’), used to denote universals, must, because of their linguistic form, also be indicating that these universals are F things. It argues that such a confusion is not to be invoked for the postulation of the paradigm case, but may prove relevant to the issue as to why Plato did not distinguish the paradigm case, independently arrived at, from the universal. It also challenges the suggestion that the Form being an F thing is due to regarding as components of proper names what are in fact quantifiers. The chapter then examines the hypothesis that, since Plato thought that e.g., the term ‘wise’ in ‘Socrates is wise’ not only described Socrates, but also properly named wisdom, he confounded proper naming and predicating to such an extent that he considered a Form when properly named ‘F’ to be also described as F and, hence, to be classified as an F thing. This approach is discounted primarily because there is no convincing evidence that Plato, in principle, took predicate adjectives to be proper names.Less
Having offered an affirmative answer to the question as to whether the Form is, for Plato, an F thing, this chapter examines the doctrine that Plato became committed to the existence of such entities because of logico-linguistic error, for example, by confusing identifying, denoting, or properly naming with describing, or predicating, such as when one assumes that such expressions as ‘to F’ (‘the F’) or ‘ho esti F’ (‘that which is F’), used to denote universals, must, because of their linguistic form, also be indicating that these universals are F things. It argues that such a confusion is not to be invoked for the postulation of the paradigm case, but may prove relevant to the issue as to why Plato did not distinguish the paradigm case, independently arrived at, from the universal. It also challenges the suggestion that the Form being an F thing is due to regarding as components of proper names what are in fact quantifiers. The chapter then examines the hypothesis that, since Plato thought that e.g., the term ‘wise’ in ‘Socrates is wise’ not only described Socrates, but also properly named wisdom, he confounded proper naming and predicating to such an extent that he considered a Form when properly named ‘F’ to be also described as F and, hence, to be classified as an F thing. This approach is discounted primarily because there is no convincing evidence that Plato, in principle, took predicate adjectives to be proper names.
Gil Diesendruck
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- January 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780199592722
- eISBN:
- 9780191731488
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199592722.003.0007
- Subject:
- Psychology, Developmental Psychology, Social Psychology
From early on in development, children assume that certain pieces of information to which they are exposed, are shared by members of their cultural community. This is indeed a crucial developmental ...
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From early on in development, children assume that certain pieces of information to which they are exposed, are shared by members of their cultural community. This is indeed a crucial developmental achievement because much of what children need to know to function adaptively in the world is knowledge that is socially constructed and bound. In many ways, defining what is conventional is akin to defining what is cultural. This chapter reviews evidence regarding both, what and who children treat as conventional, and shows that indeed from a young age, children are neither completely generalists nor universalists. While this conclusion does not deny the possibility that children start off with a promiscuous conventionality, eventually learning how to filter out certain types of knowledge or people, the evidence reviewed here highlights the need for a developmentally sensitive account of the process by which children make these distinctions. A number of mechanisms known to be available to children at the relevant ages are proposed, which can help children figure out the domain of conventions.Less
From early on in development, children assume that certain pieces of information to which they are exposed, are shared by members of their cultural community. This is indeed a crucial developmental achievement because much of what children need to know to function adaptively in the world is knowledge that is socially constructed and bound. In many ways, defining what is conventional is akin to defining what is cultural. This chapter reviews evidence regarding both, what and who children treat as conventional, and shows that indeed from a young age, children are neither completely generalists nor universalists. While this conclusion does not deny the possibility that children start off with a promiscuous conventionality, eventually learning how to filter out certain types of knowledge or people, the evidence reviewed here highlights the need for a developmentally sensitive account of the process by which children make these distinctions. A number of mechanisms known to be available to children at the relevant ages are proposed, which can help children figure out the domain of conventions.
Itziar Laka
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199590339
- eISBN:
- 9780191745041
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199590339.003.0009
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Theoretical Linguistics, Psycholinguistics / Neurolinguistics / Cognitive Linguistics
This chapter discusses how certain aspects of linguistic form specific to a language belonging to an understudied type of languages (ergative languages) yield processing results and acquisition ...
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This chapter discusses how certain aspects of linguistic form specific to a language belonging to an understudied type of languages (ergative languages) yield processing results and acquisition patterns that have hitherto rarely been reported from studies of a well-studied type of languages (nominative languages). Specifically, it discusses recent results from studies on relative-clause processing in Basque that are incompatible with the widely held assumption that subject-object language processing asymmetries are universal, and that they tap into deep aspects of linguistic structure involving the core grammatical functions ‘subject-of’ and ‘object-of’. It is argued that the processing results obtained in Basque do not entail that the structural location of subjects and objects in ergative and nominative languages is different; rather they entail that morphological differences and input-initial choices have nontrivial consequences for processing.Less
This chapter discusses how certain aspects of linguistic form specific to a language belonging to an understudied type of languages (ergative languages) yield processing results and acquisition patterns that have hitherto rarely been reported from studies of a well-studied type of languages (nominative languages). Specifically, it discusses recent results from studies on relative-clause processing in Basque that are incompatible with the widely held assumption that subject-object language processing asymmetries are universal, and that they tap into deep aspects of linguistic structure involving the core grammatical functions ‘subject-of’ and ‘object-of’. It is argued that the processing results obtained in Basque do not entail that the structural location of subjects and objects in ergative and nominative languages is different; rather they entail that morphological differences and input-initial choices have nontrivial consequences for processing.
Bertram F. Malle and Chuck Tate
- Published in print:
- 2006
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780195177664
- eISBN:
- 9780199848218
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195177664.003.0011
- Subject:
- Psychology, Cognitive Psychology
This chapter discusses a unique perspective on the processes of explanation and prediction. The major features of the folk-conceptual theory of ...
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This chapter discusses a unique perspective on the processes of explanation and prediction. The major features of the folk-conceptual theory of explanation are explained in order to develop new ideas about the temporal dimension of explanation. Then, the three layers of the theory are introduced and applied to an analysis of temporal aspects of explanation. The theory's first and fundamental layer describes the conceptual framework that underlies behavior explanations. The second layer of the folk-conceptual theory concerns the psychological processes that govern the actual construction of explanations. The third layer of the theory identifies the specific linguistic forms speakers have available in their language to express behavior explanations. It is claimed that explanations and predictions overlap to a considerable extent because they share a number of cognitive processes — processes that support the agent's attempt to construct the judgment at issue, whether it be an explanation or a prediction.Less
This chapter discusses a unique perspective on the processes of explanation and prediction. The major features of the folk-conceptual theory of explanation are explained in order to develop new ideas about the temporal dimension of explanation. Then, the three layers of the theory are introduced and applied to an analysis of temporal aspects of explanation. The theory's first and fundamental layer describes the conceptual framework that underlies behavior explanations. The second layer of the folk-conceptual theory concerns the psychological processes that govern the actual construction of explanations. The third layer of the theory identifies the specific linguistic forms speakers have available in their language to express behavior explanations. It is claimed that explanations and predictions overlap to a considerable extent because they share a number of cognitive processes — processes that support the agent's attempt to construct the judgment at issue, whether it be an explanation or a prediction.
Kerwin Lee Klein
- Published in print:
- 2011
- Published Online:
- March 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520268814
- eISBN:
- 9780520948297
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520268814.003.0007
- Subject:
- History, Historiography
This chapter explores one strand of popular and political discourse about the past in the recent United States. It notes that for an emergent Christian conservative movement, memory and related ...
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This chapter explores one strand of popular and political discourse about the past in the recent United States. It notes that for an emergent Christian conservative movement, memory and related linguistic forms aided in opening nominally secular public spaces to Judeo-Christian constructions of the past. It demonstrates that memory talk helped a newly muscular Christianity reduce history to eschatology.Less
This chapter explores one strand of popular and political discourse about the past in the recent United States. It notes that for an emergent Christian conservative movement, memory and related linguistic forms aided in opening nominally secular public spaces to Judeo-Christian constructions of the past. It demonstrates that memory talk helped a newly muscular Christianity reduce history to eschatology.
Lila Gleitman and Barbara Landau
- Published in print:
- 2012
- Published Online:
- January 2013
- ISBN:
- 9780199590339
- eISBN:
- 9780191745041
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199590339.003.0006
- Subject:
- Linguistics, Theoretical Linguistics, Psycholinguistics / Neurolinguistics / Cognitive Linguistics
Drawing upon the work of Carol Chomsky, this chapter focuses on two specific issues. The first concerns the robustness of language acquisition to variability in learners' access to input that appear ...
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Drawing upon the work of Carol Chomsky, this chapter focuses on two specific issues. The first concerns the robustness of language acquisition to variability in learners' access to input that appear crucial to the function being acquired, as seen from language studies in people who became both deaf and blind during infancy. The second concerns the abilities of children to reconstruct the meanings of sentences with covert structure, as in Carol Chomsky's landmark studies of whether blindfolded dolls might be hard to see. These two themes exemplify the general problem known as ‘the poverty of the stimulus’; in the present case, how humans reconstruct linguistic form and meaning from the blatantly inadequate information offered in their usable environment.Less
Drawing upon the work of Carol Chomsky, this chapter focuses on two specific issues. The first concerns the robustness of language acquisition to variability in learners' access to input that appear crucial to the function being acquired, as seen from language studies in people who became both deaf and blind during infancy. The second concerns the abilities of children to reconstruct the meanings of sentences with covert structure, as in Carol Chomsky's landmark studies of whether blindfolded dolls might be hard to see. These two themes exemplify the general problem known as ‘the poverty of the stimulus’; in the present case, how humans reconstruct linguistic form and meaning from the blatantly inadequate information offered in their usable environment.
