Mastering how to convey meanings using language is perhaps the main challenge facing any language learner. However, satisfactory accounts of how this is achieved, and even of what it is for a linguistic item to have meaning, are hard to come by. Nick Chater was one of the pioneers involved in the early development of one of the most successful methodologies within the cognitive science of language for discovering meaning: distributional semantics. In this article, we review this approach and (...) discuss its successes and shortcomings in capturing semantic phenomena. In particular, we discuss what we dub the “distributional paradox:” how can models that do not implement essential dimensions of human semantic processing, such as sensorimotor grounding, capture so many meaning-related phenomena? We conclude by providing a preliminary answer, arguing that distributional models capture the statistical scaffolding of human language acquisition that allows for communication, which, in line with Nick Chater's more recent ideas, has been shaped by the features of human cognition on the timescale of cultural evolution. (shrink)

Lewis signalling games are often used to explain how it is possible for simple agents to develop systems of conventional semantic meaning. In these games, all players obtain identical payoffs in every outcome. This is an unrealistic payoff structure, but it is often employed because it is thought that semantic meaning will not emerge if interests conflict. Here it is shown that not only is conventional meaning possible when interests conflict, but it is the most likely outcome in (...) a finite population model of learning known as the Moran process. On the basis of this result it is suggested that evolutionary game theory’s standard models may yield results that are systematically distorted for a class of signalling games that have the abstract structure of social dilemmas. 1 Introduction2 The Seduction Game3 Imitation Dynamics with Small Mutations4 Dynamics with Unverifiable Message5 Analysis of a Related Three-Strategy Game6 Conclusion. (shrink)

When words are read, the visual cortex is activated, independent of whether visual or motor associations are elicited. This word-evoked brain activity is significantly influenced by semantic meaning. Such effects occur very early after stimulus presentation (at latencies between 80 and 130 msec), indicating that semantic meaning activates different neuronal assemblies in the human visual cortex when words are processed.

This edited book brings together research work in the field of constructive semantics with scholarship on the phenomenological foundations of logic and mathematics. It addresses one of the central issues in the epistemology and philosophy of mathematics, namely the relationship between phenomenological meaning constitution and constructive semantics. Contributing authors explore deep structural connections and fundamental differences between phenomenology and constructivism. Papers are drawn from contributions to a prestigious workshop held at the University of Friedrichshafen. Readers will discover insight into structural (...) connections between the phenomenological concept of meaning constitution and constructivist concepts of meaning. Discussion ranges from more specific conceptualizations in the philosophy of logic and mathematics to more general considerations in epistemology, inferential semantics and phenomenology. Questions such as a possible phenomenological understanding of the relationship between structural rules and particle rules in dialogical logic are explored. Significant aspects of both phenomenology and dialectics, and dialectics and constructivism emerge. Graduates and researchers of philosophy, especially logic, as well as scholars of mathematics will all find something of interest in the expert insights presented in this volume. (shrink)

Davidson argues that metaphorical sentences express no propositional contents other than the explicit literal contents they express. He offers a causal account, on the one hand, as an explanation of the supposed additional content of a metaphor in terms of the effects metaphors have on hearers, and on the other hand, as a reason for the non-propositional nature of the “something more” that a metaphor is alleged to mean. Davidson’s account is meant to restrict the semantic notions of meaning, (...) content, and truth, to literal sentences. I argue that the Davidsonian causal account does not satisfactorily account for metaphor’s figurativeness, speakers’ assertion and hearers’ uptake of metaphor, and our discursive practices of using metaphors in disagreements and argumentation. I offer a non-compositional analysis of a semantic account of metaphor within which one can make sense of the applicability of the notions of meaning and content to metaphor. This analysis shows that metaphorical sentences have meanings other than, and in addition to, their literal meanings and what speakers can use them to mean. (shrink)

A criticism is offered of the chief argument employed by Davidson to debunk the notion of “metaphorical meaning”, which exploits the static nature of standard truth-conditional semantics. We argue, first, that Davidson's argument fails, and go on to suggest, secondly, that truth-conditional semantics would profit if the static feature were abandoned and were replaced by a processual, dynamic conception of meaning. We try to show that this processual aspect can be captured without making the ensuing semantic theory open to (...) the charge of psychologism. (shrink)

Kenneth A. Taylor examines the complex relationship between semantic analysis and metaphysical inquiry with the aim of bringing philosophical methodology into closer alignment with total science. He urges philosophers who seek metaphysical insight to interrogate reality itself rather than language and concepts.

This chapter develops a semantic theory for maps and situates it within the broader geography of meaning and semiotic significance. The discussion focuses on three central aspects of map semantics: the use of space, line marking, and linguistic tags. It is argued that the treatment of space in maps must be based on geometrical projection from a viewpoint rather than the traditional analysis in terms of spatial isomorphism. The chapter then shows how to integrate the projection-based semantics of maps (...) and the symbolic semantics of markers and tags, within the framework of possible-world semantics. The resulting account addresses issues of accuracy, viewpoint, orientation, and exhaustivity. (shrink)

Describing his creative process, David Bowie stated: “I’ll take articles out of newspapers, poems that I’ve written, pieces of other people’s books, and put them all into this little warehouse, thi...

This self-contained introduction to natural language semantics addresses the majortheoretical questions in the field. The authors introduce the systematic study of linguistic meaningthrough a sequence of formal tools and their linguistic applications. Starting with propositionalconnectives and truth conditions, the book moves to quantification and binding, intensionality andtense, and so on. To set their approach in a broader perspective, the authors also explore theinteraction of meaning with context and use (the semantics-pragmatics interface) and address some ofthe foundational questions, especially in connection (...) with cognition in general. They also introducea few of the most accessible and interesting ideas from recent research to give the reader a bit ofthe flavor of current work in semantics. The organization of this new edition is modular; after theintroductory chapters, the remaining material can be covered in flexible order. The book presupposesno background in formal logic (an appendix introduces the basic notions of set theory) and only aminimal acquaintance with linguistics. This edition includes a substantial amount of completely newmaterial and has been not only updated but redesigned throughout to enhance itsuser-friendliness. (shrink)

The eloquence and the continuity of the words and their meaning in the Holy Quran cannot be constructed by any human being, as their order was instituted by the prophet (PBUH). No human being can add, delete or modify this order nor move any verse backward or forward. This research explored the order of meanings related to the eloquence of the verses of the Holy Quran, including a review of those meanings in progressive patterns, to prove the arguments (...) and ingenuity of Quranic brevity, as contained in a scholarly volume Al-Naba al-Azim, by Dr. Abdullah Draz. The research aimed to extract the exact order of the Quranic meanings and connection of this order with the eloquence of the verse. It included the order of tools of arguments, methods to build the verse, the order of Quranic brevity, and the extent of its inclusiveness of meanings of the Holy Quran. The study found out that the order of Quranic meanings has remarkable characteristics like semantic escalation, and the structural coherence and a symmetrical order of all the verses. It was also revealed that Dr. Draz pioneered the argument on the order of the Quranic brevity and the order of meanings that are hidden between the verses. The study recommends to conduct future researches on the phenomenon of semantic escalation, search for the meanings hidden behind the Quranic structures, deduce the silent tools which are used by the Holy Quran to sustain arguments. The study also recommends that studies should be conducted to elaborate the meanings of the Quranic verses that have been mentioned only briefly. (shrink)

Contemporary semantic theory rests upon lively theoretical disputes about the meaning of words, the proper form of semantic theory, and, ultimately, on the very possibility of semantic theory itself. Jay L. Garfield and Murray Kiteley have collected, in Meaning and Truth, the definitive articles on the history of semantics and the primary voices debating the interpretation of description, the theory of truth intensionality, the structure of meaning, natural language, and the relation of semantics to pragmatics. The details, (...) complexities, and charming eccentricities of language thus become visible against a background of abstract theory. Undergraduate and graduate students of semantics, linguistics, cognitive psychology, and philosophy of language will now be able to encounter all of the important theoretical debates of modern semantics in a single volume. Selections begin with the classic essay by Mill, "Of Names and Propositions," include such standards as "General Semantics" by Lewis and "Actualism" by Plantinga, and conclude with a chapter on "Linguistic Approaches to Semantics.". (shrink)

Supervaluationism, traditionally conceived, is the conjunction of three theses: Vagueness in a language gives rise to there being a multitude of acceptable assignments of semantic values to some expressions of the language, These assignments correspond to possible completions of the meanings of vague expressions, Truth is truth under all acceptable assignments, and falsity is falsity under all acceptable assignments. Supervaluationism has three chief virtues. It preserves classical logic. It provides an account of what vagueness is . And it (...) extends nicely to the vagueness of singular terms. I argue, however, that the existence of vagueifiers ‐ expressions like‘roughly’– pose problems for thesis of Supervaluationism, and that the supervaluationist can get around these problems only at a serious cost. Toward the end of the paper, I present an alternative analysis of vagueness, which preserves the main virtues of Supervaluationism, but which identifies vagueness as semantic Overdetermination, rather than as semantic underdetermination. (shrink)

The paper has two principal aims. First, Pietroski's sparse account of semantic composition will be favourably compared to the familiar full Frege hierarchy of composed semantic types. Second, I shall introduce the idea of a head as employed in linguistics and pose the problem of how to square Pietroski's compositional principles with the asymmetry entailed by headedness. The paper will leave the problem of headedness as an outstanding issue to be resolved.

Listening to speech in a language you know differs phenomenologically from listening to speech in an unfamiliar language, a fact often exploited in debates about the phenomenology of thought and cognition. It is plausible that the difference is partly perceptual. Some contend that hearing familiar language involves auditory perceptual awareness of meanings or semantic properties of spoken utterances; but if this were so, there must be something distinctive it is like auditorily to perceptually experience specific meanings of (...) spoken utterances. However, an argument from homophony shows that auditory experiences do not resolve differences in meaning not marked by differences in sound. I propose an alternative explanation of the perceptual phenomenal difference in terms of perceptual awareness of language-specific but non-semantic features. (shrink)

Most meanings we express belong to large families of variant meanings, among which it would be implausible to suppose that some are much more apt for being expressed than others. This abundance of candidate meanings creates pressure to think that the proposition attributing any particular meaning to an expression is modally plastic: its truth depends very sensitively on the exact microphysical state of the world. However, such plasticity seems to threaten ordinary counterfactuals whose consequents contain speech reports, (...) since it is hard to see how we could reasonably be confident in a counterfactual whose consequent can be true only if a certain very finely tuned microphysical configuration obtains. This essay develops the foregoing puzzle and explores several possible solutions. (shrink)

ABSTRACT It is often observed that experiences of utterance understanding are what surfaces in hearer’s consciousness in the course of language comprehension. The nature of such experiences has been a hotly debated topic. One influential position in this debate is the semantic perceptual view, according to which meaning properties can be perceived. In this paper I present two new challenges for the view that we can become perceptually aware of meaning properties in auditory experience or, in brief, that we (...) can hear meanings. The first challenge concerns the issue of providing a plausible model of meaning perception. The second challenge consists in accommodating the crucial role of cognition in the etiology of such experiences. Drawing on these observations, I will suggest a new account, according to which experiences of understanding have a complex, mixed nature involving both perceptual and cognitive elements. (shrink)

This article presents the study of methodological approaches to the study of the traditional sacred ethnoregional culture of Altai. The essence of the concept of "sacred" culture is considered. The theoretical aspects of the study of the "sacred" ethnoregional culture of Altai are revealed. A comparative analysis of various traditional forms of sacredness in the development of the ethnoregional culture of Altai is carried out. The problem of preserving the cultural heritage of Altai is considered.The purpose of the study is (...) to reveal the features of traditional sacred meanings in the ethnoregional culture of Altai. Objectives: - to consider the theoretical aspects of the study of the sacred ethnoregional culture of Altai; - to conduct a comparative analysis of various traditional forms of sacredness in the development of the ethnoregional culture of Altai. The subject of the study is the traditional sacred meanings in the ethnoregional culture of Altai.The object of the study is the ethnoregional culture of Altai. The practical significance of this work lies in the possibility of using the data obtained in the creation of local regional programs for the preservation of ethnocultural traditionalism. The method and methodology of the work: the basis of the research is the principle of a systematic approach. To study methodological approaches to research, the sources of information were textbooks and monographs by such authors as M. Eliade, T.V. Bernyukevich, I.Ya. Murzina, N.I. Kaplan, G.M. Kazakova, V.A. Lipinskaya and others. Based on this study, it can be concluded that the culture of Altai is a huge layer of ethnographically diverse ethnic groups. Each ethnic group has its own sacred values and social patterns through which these values can be passed on to subsequent generations. This can be traced by the example of the Altai house painting, in everyday objects there is a complex semantic complex of sacralization. On the one hand, painting appears as a way of sacralizing human existence, on the other hand, it is a channel for transmitting appropriate social patterns that influence the consolidation of bearers of a particular culture. The boundaries of the sacred here are determined by the substantial meanings of human existence and the civilizational level of development of the sacralization of values. Traditional sacred meanings are intertwined with the way of life, culture and way of life of the people. (shrink)

The paper offers a critical review of the role played by lexical meaning in the earlier stages of philosophical semantics and truth-conditional semantics. I shall address, both historically and theoretically, the relative neglect of lexical semantics within these fields, and argue that the approach to word meaning fostered in extensional frameworks is overall inconsistent with the customary assumption that truth-theoretic semantics can be considered a semantic theory proprio sensu.

Abstract: This paper introduces and analyses the doctrine of externalism about semantic content; discusses the Twin Earth argument for externalism and the assumptions behind it, and examines the question of whether externalism about content is compatible with a privileged knowledge of meanings and mental contents.

In recent discussions on the meaning of derogatory terms, most theorists base their investigations on the assumption that slurring terms could in principle have some neutral, i.e. purely descriptive, counterpart. Lauren Ashwell has recently shown that this assumption does not generalize to gendered slurs. This paper aims to challenge the point and benefit of approaching the meaning of derogatory terms in contrast to their allegedly purely descriptive counterparts. I argue that different discursive practices among different communities of practice sometimes change (...) the semantics of a term. By the example of the term ‘black,’ I show in what ways these different practices may amount to semantic contestations which complicate the assessment of whether a specific politically significant term is purely descriptive. My discussion of politically significant terms provides insights into further phenomena such as the appropriation of derogatory terms by the target group or meaning change more generally. Moreover, it not only accounts for the political aspects of a linguistic phenomenon, but equally highlights and explains the oft-neglected but crucial role that language plays in social and political struggles. It thus contributes to ongoing discussions both in philosophy of language and in social and political philosophy. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to determine the psychological meaning of coauthorship for a group of scientists, based on the assumption that the meaning of a concept is related to experience on “how a person behaves in a situation, depending on what the situation signifies to him”. The semantic meaning provides for an interpretation of action in beliefs, goals and intentions, following the idea that semantic meaning is a basis for inferring intentions to perform action. We used (...) the Natural Semantic Networks Method. We interviewed 162 scientists in the physical and natural sciences. Results show a cluster of the semantic meaning of coauthorship in which collaboration, teamwork, work, common interest, discussion and others, are retrieved from memory and represented as a natural semantic network of the concept of coauthorship. Collaboration and teamwork are the two concepts that have the highest semantic value and this holds true for various disciplines although teamwork is the most elicited word associated to coauthorship. We propose a model in which coauthorship represents the result of the experience, attitudes and behavior of a group process concerning collaboration and teamwork in science. (shrink)

Meaning Holism and Contextualism are standardly acknowledged to be similar relativistic theories that often lead to similar troubles, in particular to issues concerning instability. On the other hand, the main rival of Contextualism, which is Minimalism, is taken to be resistant to these problems. In effect, it seems inevitable to see Meaning Holism and Minimalism as natural enemies. In my paper, I attempt to reject such a view. My argumentation consists of three main parts. First, I argue that Minimalism does (...) not differ that much from Meaning Holism with respect to the instability issues as it also faces some of them (although in a slightly different way from the case of Holism of Contextualism). Second, I put forward several arguments to show that in fact Minimalism is not incompatible with the two versions of Meaning Holism I distinguish, namely Global Holism and Local Holism. I argue that a meaning holist has to accept some not uncontroversial principles to become an anti- minimalist – and vice versa. Finally, I demonstrate that Minimalism and Meaning Holism can be reconciled. Such a possibility occurs when something I called ‘purely semantic processes’ is allowed. The role of these processes is, roughly speaking, to protect literal meanings from being affected by strong pragmatic factors. (shrink)

The concept of "good" is one of the essential concepts of moral philosophy. The author focuses on the semantic analysis of the word "good" as it has been delivered by the representatives of Angloamerican moral philosophy of the fifties and the sixties . The analytic moral philosophy called attention to the fundamental ethical questions, such as Are moral norms justifiable?; How are they justifiable?; Are moral concepts and moral propositions transcendental by their nature, or are they intersubjective?

ABSTRACT Temporal externalism is the view that the meanings and extensions of linguistic expressions can be partly determined by contingent linguistic and/or conceptual developments that take place after the time of utterance. In this paper, I first clarify what it would take for temporal externalism to be true, relying on the notion of burden-shifting dispositions. I then go on to argue that existing thought experiments give us reason to expect that temporal externalism can be true of some natural kind (...) terms, and present a new thought experiment suggesting it can also be true of some proper names. (shrink)

This book presents an innovative and novel approach to linguistic semantics, beginning with the idea that language can be described as a system for the expression of linguistic Meanings as particular surface forms or Texts.

Paul M. Pietroski presents an ambitious new account of human languages as generative procedures that respect substantive constraints. He argues that meanings are neither concepts nor extensions, and sentences do not have truth conditions; meanings are composable instructions for how to access and assemble concepts of a special sort.

This book offers a semantic and metasemantic inquiry into the representation of meaning in linguistic interaction. Kasia Jaszczolt offers a new contextualist take on the semantics/pragmatics boundary, and argues that this is the only promising stance on meaning. This approach allows the selection of the cognitively plausible object of enquiry - namely the intended, primary meaning - and its adoption as a unit of semantic analysis despite the varying provenance of the contributing information. The analysis transcends the said/implicated (...) distinction and heavily relies on the dynamic construction of meaning in discourse, using truth conditions as a tool and at the same time conforming to pragmatic compositionality. Meaning in Linguistic Interaction builds on the author's earlier work on Default Semantics, and adds new arguments in favour of radical contextualism, particularly with regard to the role of salience, the dynamic nature of the unit that forms a basis of the interpretation process, and the flexibility of word meaning. It is illustrated with examples from a variety of languages and offers formal representations of meaning in the metalanguage of Default Semantics. (shrink)

Volume 6, Issue 3, September 2015, Page 310-346.

Can mere conceptual competence explain the apriori? Many contemporary theorists believe that conceptual competence grounds apriori conceptual truths – and that this fact helps explain how thinkers can have apriori justification for accepting these truths and reasoning in accord with them. In this chapter, I'll examine several contemporary defenses of the conceptual approach to apriority in order to clarify their core commitments about the nature of concepts. The common thread, I'll argue, is a picture of concepts that combines a conceptual (...) role model of conceptual competence with a rationalizing approach to the determination of semantic contents. My first aim is to show how this model of concepts has the potential to ground apriori truth and justification. My second aim is to show how the model involves problematic commitments about concepts, which can be avoided on an alternative relational model of concepts. (shrink)

In this fascinating work, Scott Soames offers a new conception of the relationship between linguistic meaning and assertions made by utterances. He gives meanings of proper names and natural kind predicates and explains their use in attitude ascriptions. He also demonstrates the irrelevance of rigid designation in understanding why theoretical identities containing such predicates are necessary, if true.

Presentations of Gricean semantics, including Stephen Neale’s in “Silent Reference,” totally ignore vagueness, even though virtually every utterance is vague. I ask how Gricean semantics might be adjusted to accommodate vague speaker-meaning. My answer is that it can’t accommodate it: the Gricean program collapses in the face of vague speaker-meaning. The Gricean might, however, find some solace in knowing that every other extant meta-semantic and semantic program is in the same boat.

"Adaptation" has several meanings which have often been confused, including relations, processes, states, and intrinsic properties. It is used in comparative and historical contexts. "Adaptation" and "environment" may designate probabilistic concepts. Recognition of these points refutes arguments for the notions that: 1) all organisms are perfectly adapted; 2) organisms cannot be ill-adapted and survive or well-adapted and die; 3) adaptation is necessarily relative to the environment; 4) change in environment is necessary for evolution; 5) preadaptation implies teleology. Such notions (...) are associated with metaphysical ideas, and may affect the thinking of biologists. (shrink)

This book offers a new approach to the analysis of the multiple meanings of English modals, conjunctions, conditionals, and perception verbs. Although such ambiguities cannot easily be accounted for by feature-analyses of word meaning, Eve Sweetser's argument shows that they can be analyzed both readily and systematically. Meaning relationships in general cannot be understood independently of human cognitive structure, including the metaphorical and cultural aspects of that structure. Sweetser shows that both lexical polysemy and pragmatic ambiguity are shaped by (...) our metaphorical folk understanding of epistemic processes and of speech interaction. Similar regularities can be shown to structure the contrast among root, epistemic and speech act uses of modal verbs, multiple uses of conjunctions and conditionals, and certain processes of historical change observed in Indo-European languages. Since polysemy is typically the intermediate step in semantic change, the same regularities observable in polysemy can be extended to an analysis of semantic change. (shrink)

Syntactic semantics is a holistic, conceptual-role-semantic theory of how computers can think. But Fodor and Lepore have mounted a sustained attack on holistic semantic theories. However, their major problem with holism (that, if holism is true, then no two people can understand each other) can be fixed by means of negotiating meanings. Syntactic semantics and Fodor and Lepore’s objections to holism are outlined; the nature of communication, miscommunication, and negotiation is discussed; Bruner’s ideas about the negotiation of (...) meaning are explored; and some observations on a problem for knowledge representation in AI raised by Winston are presented. (shrink)

In this paper, I present a new semantics for demonstratives. Now some may think that David Kaplan (1989a,b) has already given a more than satisfactory semantics for demonstratives, and that there is no need for a new one. But I argue below that Kaplan's theory fails to describe the linguistic meanings of 'that' and other true demonstratives. My argument for this conclusion has nothing to do with cognitive value, belief sentences, or other such contentious matters in semantics and the (...) philosophy of mind. Rather, it appeals to the obvious fact that there can be true utterances of certain sentences containing several occurrences of the same demonstrative (for instance, 'That is taller than that'). My argument can be answered by making a fairly modest revision in Kaplan's theory. But I believe that the resulting revised version of Kaplan's theory ignores or distorts various important semantic features of 'that'. Thus I ultimately argue in favor of a more substantial departure from Kaplan's theory. Perhaps the most remarkable feature of the theory I favor is that it ascribes three distinct sorts of meanings to demonstratives. (shrink)

Michael Devitt is a distinguished philosopher of language. In this book he takes up one of the most important difficulties that must be faced by philosophical semantics: namely, the threat posed by holism. Three important questions lie at the core of this book: what are the main objectives of semantics; why are they worthwhile; how should we accomplish them? Devitt answers these 'methodological' questions naturalistically and explores what semantic programme arises from the answers. The approach is anti-Cartesian, rejecting the (...) idea that linguistic or conceptual competence yields any privileged access to meanings. This new methodology is used first against holism. Devitt argues for a truth-referential localism, and in the process rejects direct-reference, two-factor, and verificationist theories. The book concludes by arguing against revisionism, eliminativism, and the idea that we should ascribe narrow meanings to explain behaviour. (shrink)

Meanings are the most elusive objects of linguistic research. The article summarizes the type of evidence we have for them: various types of metalinguistic activities like paraphrasing and translating, the ability to name entities and judge sentences true or false, as well as various behavioral and physiological measures such as reaction time studies, eye tracking.

I use the psychological phenomenon of ‘attribute framing’ as a case study for exploring philosophical conceptions of semantics and the semantics-pragmatics divide. Attribute frames are pairs of sentences that use contradictory expressions to predicate the same property of an individual or object. Despite their equivalence, pairs of attribute frames have been observed to induce systematic variability in hearers’ responses. One explanation of such framing effects appeals to the distinct ‘reference point information’ conveyed by alternative frames. Although this information is taken (...) to be pragmatic, a live debate in the philosophy of language concerns the extent to which pragmatic information can really be held apart from semantics. Therefore, in this article I examine whether – and how – reference point information might be thought to intrude on the semantics of an attribute frame. I describe two ways in which the information might be considered broadly semantic, due to its being directly communicated or conventional. However, I argue that the framing data in fact support a narrower conception of semantics, and a semantics-pragmatics distinction that separates standing sentence meaning from enriched communicated meaning. (shrink)

A volume of studies in philosophical logic by a group of younger philosophers in the UK. There is a core of problems in the theory of meaning which have been accorded a central importance by philosophers, logicians and theoretical linguists, and which have stimulated some of the most powerful and original work in these subjects. The contributors to the volume have a common interest in these topics, insist on their continuing and fundamental importance, and offer here a distinctive and original (...) contribution to them. (shrink)

Mental (or semantic) holism is the doctrine that the identity of a belief content (or the meaning of a sentence that expresses it) is determined by its place in the web of beliefs or sentences comprising a whole theory or group of theories. It can be contrasted with two other views: atomism and molecularism. Molecularism characterizes meaning and content in terms of relatively small parts of the web in a way that allows many different theories to share those parts. (...) For example, the meaning of 'chase' might be said by a molecularist to be try to catch. Atomism characterizes meaning and content in terms of none of the web; it says that sentences and beliefs have meaning or content independently of their relations to other sentences or beliefs. One major motivation for holism has come from reflections on the natures of confirmation and learning. As Quine (1953) observed, claims about the world are confirmed not individually, but only in conjunction with theories of which they are a part. And typically, one cannot come to understand scientific claims without understanding a significant chunk of the theory of which they are a part. For example, in learning the Newtonian concepts of 'force', 'mass', kinetic energy' and 'momentum', one doesn't learn any definitions of these terms in terms that are understood beforehand, for there are no such definitions. Rather, these theoretical terms were all learned together in conjunction with procedures for solving problems. The major problem with holism is that it threatens to make generalization in psychology virtually impossible. If the content of any state depends on all others, it would be extremely unlikely that any two believers would ever share a state with the same content. Moreover, holism would appear to conflict with our ordinary conception of reasoning. What sentences one accepts influence what one infers. if i accept a sentence and then later reject it, i thereby change the inferential role of that sentence, so the meaning of what i accept wouldn't be the same as what i later reject. but then it would be difficult to understand on this view how one could rationally --or even irrationally!-- change one's mind. and agreement and translation are also problematic for much the same reason. holists have responded (1) by proposing that we should think not in terms of "same/different" meaning but in terms of a gradient of similarity of meaning, (2) by proposing "two factor" theories or (3) by simply accepting the consequence that there is no real difference between changing meanings and changing beliefs. (shrink)

The Principle of Semantic Compositionality (sometimes called Frege''s Principle) is the principle that the meaning of a (syntactically complex) whole is a function only of the meanings of its (syntactic) parts together with the manner in which these parts were combined. This principle has been extremely influential throughout the history of formal semantics; it has had a tremendous impact upon modern linguistics ever since Montague Grammars became known; and it has more recently shown up as a guiding principle (...) for a certain direction in cognitive science.Despite the fact that The Principle is vague or underspecified at a number of points — such as what meaning is, what counts as a part, what counts as a syntactic complex, what counts as combination — this has not stopped some people from viewing The Principle as obviously true, true almost by definition. And it has not stopped other people from viewing The Principle as false, almost pernicious in its effect. And some of these latter theorists think that it is an empirically false principle while others think of it as a methodologically wrong-headed way to proceed. (shrink)

This paper offers a general model of the semantics of lexicalized social meanings, i.e. semiotic properties of certain expressions in a socio-political context. Examples include slurs, problematically charged expressions such as inner city, as well as terms such as mother, which also carry implicit ideological associations. Insofar as their linguistic properties are concerned, social meanings can be construed as context-structuring devices: without introducing specific at-issue contents, they evoke background assumptions which shape the context of conversation. An inferentialist model (...) of discourse is developed to account for this effect, in which the discursive significance of an utterance is defined as the set of inferences it licenses relative to a discursive context. A discursive context is a set of propositions that can serve as auxiliary premises in material inferences, together with a salience ranking that makes some of these propositions more readily available and therefore more relevant to determining discursive significance. Social meanings are defined as functions on discursive contexts that modify the salience ranking, increasing the salience of certain assumptions and stereotypes. As a result, they impact the discursive significance of utterances indirectly and independently of at-issue contents. They are also largely independent of speaker intentions in virtue of the ideological nature of discursive contexts. (shrink)