didn't quite get it until I thought of "our only point of contact" in a sort of Flatland way -- imagine that all you know of the line is what you know as a point on it, take its point of view, and to be such a point is to see a neverending expanse of line to either side of you — Srap Tasmaner

Similarly, philosophers in Flatland will conclude that there can be no third dimension. Every point in their experience has only a left and right, forward and back. A point with additional directions would be outside of their experience, and so not a point at all.

Here is another example:

S2: "The point on the ground two feet in front of you"

This has the same meaning for everyone who reads it. I would translate it into the same words in French no matter where I was standing. And yet, for every reader, the referent is a different point.

Same meaning, different referents.

Please explain where I go wrong. :chin: — jgill

Putnam is setting up an artificial scenario where two people's mental states are identical when they use a term, and yet the term is referring to different things. Therefore he concludes that meaning must involve more than just mental state, it must be located in the state of the world.

In your case, your mental states are different when you are using the same terms, and they are referring to different things. This is just ambiguity.

So reference is to some particular item (e.g. glass of liquid), whereas meaning is reference to a wider class or extension (e.g. of water)? — bongo fury

I'm not using any philosophical jargon here.

Simply, we English speakers all know what S means. It is basic English. But we don't know to what it refers.

Therefore, meaning and reference are distinct concepts, and must not be conflated.

Therefore, it makes sense to say that water means the same thing on Earth and Twin Earth, and yet it refers to different substances.

Same meaning in each case, but different referent. Hence, the argument goes, the meaning of "water" is not its chemical composition. — Banno

Trouble is, this just isn't what Putnam says.


From the paper:

Let W 1 and W 2 be two possible worlds in which I exist and in which
this glass exists and in which I am giving a meaning explanation by
pointing to this glass and saying "this is water." (We do not assume
that the liquid in the glass is the same in both worlds.) Let us suppose
that in W 1 the glass is full of H20 and in W2 the glass is full of XYZ.
We shall also suppose that W 1 is the actual world and that XYZ is the
stuff typically called "water" in the world W 2 (so that the relation between English speakers in W 1 and English speakers in W 2 is exactly
the same as the relation between English speakers on Earth and English
speakers on Twin Earth). Then there are two theories one might have
concerning the meaning of "water."
( 1) One might hold that "water" was world-relative but constant in
meaning (i.e., the word has a constant relative meaning). On this
theory, "water" means the same in W 1 and W 2; it's just that water is
H20 in W 1 and water is XYZ in Wz.
(2) One might hold that water is H20 in all worlds (the stuff called
"water" in W 2 isn't water), but "water" doesn't have the same meaning
in W1 and Wz.
If what was said before about the Twin Earth case was correct, then
( 2) is clearly the correct theory.

No, meaning is social. It is stable whatever or whether we think of it.

Interpretation is what is in the head.

The two claims are not contradictory, so no.

My correction:
1) The symbols themselves are not concept-independent, as if sounds or markings were not already interpretive meanings.
2)The meaning of symbols can’t be divorced from its interpretation by an individual in a given context.
3)Interpretation doesnt just compare itself to an extant set of rules for meaning. It is the only place where meaning actually arises.
4) We can’t speak of objects in the world outside of the objects that we form through our conceptual interpretations — Joshs

1) Are you speaking of the difference between the physical markings and their interpretation as letters or phonemes? I agree, this should be distinguished.
2) No, it is absolutely divorced. You can see this by looking at an incompetent language user. A poor English user might understand "Water is wet" to mean water is slippery. This interpretation does not impact the meaning of the sentence, which remains water is wet
3) Languages users don't just compare, they have to actively construct an interpretation. As above, this construction is distinct from the meaning of the sentence.
4) But then, cf. the Twin Earth you cited to me.

But there seems to be an inconsistency in that you agreed "meaning is something like a social reality" then recanted with "Sentences are just tools used to induce thoughts in others". — Banno

Not inconsistent, I didn't recant. Sentences, whose meanings are something like social realities, are tools used to induce thoughts in others.

Another tack:

Sentences are just tools used to induce thoughts in others (or represent thoughts to ourselves, when thinking). It is the thoughts themselves which are true and false. A sentence is true if, when interpreted correctly, it induces true thoughts.

This is helpful because it removes the ambiguity of language which otherwise confounds the concept of truth, when truth or falsehood is applied to sentences themselves.

I agree. But meaning then must be distinguished from interpretation, which is in the head.

I see four distinct components to a sentence:

1: The symbols themselves: The sounds or markings.
2: The meaning of the symbols: This is determined by language rules and context, and may be more or less ambiguous. This is not in the listener's or reader's head.
3: The interpretation: this is the mental schema the listener or reader conjures up, using the language rules and context as best they can, attempting to match the meaning.
4: The referent: The object in the world, the phenomena, or the abstract idea the sentence is referring to.

Yep, why not? — bongo fury

If I imagine that there is a dragon on Neptune, that imagining is in my head, not Neptune. Are you claiming that meaning is something like a social reality which is not localized in any one person's head?

Eh? — bongo fury

You just claimed that meaning and reference were synonymous.



I'm not sure how your earlier post pertains.

We may or may not pretend some corresponding bolt of energy passes between the symbol and object themselves.

But I'm treating meaning as synonymous with reference — bongo fury

So meaning is both purely imaginary and not in the head, an imaginary lightning bolt from symbol to object which is also the object? This does not strike me as a particularly coherent account.

And recommends dropping it. — bongo fury

Then how does he deal with sentences with no referent? "The cat in the hat" has meaning but no reference in the world. If the meaning of "The cat in the hat" is in your head, then mustn't all meaning be in the head?

It is invented, or pretended, by people using their heads, but that doesn't locate it in the head. — bongo fury

Then where is it located?

The meaning of "the water is cold" is not about chemical composition. It is certainly not about some covert inaccessible property of water. It is about the everyday water we experience. This is the same in both worlds. Only the referents are different.

If the meaning of "water" was swapped with "fire", then of course the meanings of the sentences would be different. And then the sentence would translate into different foreign sentences on the two worlds.

He illustrated this with his twin earth experiment. — Joshs

I'd come across this at some point before, I found it very unconvincing, then and now.

I would say that Putnam is conflating meaning and referent.

The meaning of "the water is cold" is the same on Earth and Twin Earth. We can see this by the fact that it would translate to the same sentences in other languages on both planets.

It just so happens that the worldly referent on Twin Earth is different.

What are interpretations? I would say: sentences that help us construe symbols as pointing at things. What would you say? — bongo fury

Interpretations are the meanings we construe from sentences. Meaning is what the sentence points to, not the sentence itself. It is the signified, not the signifier.

Meaning is not something in the world either, it is something in the head (otherwise, how can we make sense of abstractions, lies, or fictions?).

We can express meanings with sentences in one language or another, with body language, with pictures.

Sentence, meaning, worldly referent are all not identical, do you agree?

My feeling is that it is a mainly a combination of this and 5. Where a civilization would have slipped through the cracks of one, the other snuffs it out.

The rare civilization that would survive it's self extinction period would not commit itself to the extraordinary and costly endeavor of space travel. Seek within, not without, and all that. And the one which would have committed itself would have done so ultimately out of an intense drive to dominate the universe, and so can never survive its self extinction period .

And if 4 is true, if civilizations are deeply improbable, then it is just hopeless.

I believe that understanding is always liberating. Ignorance is not bliss, false concepts can only lead to disappointment and depression.

Life may have no meaning, but only in the false conception where meaning is something bestowed on it from without. In truth, meaning is something you invest your life with.

Eternal life of an individual, family, society, or species is a false concept that cannot be realized and so can only disappoint and depress. To understand life is too understand that it is temporally bound. This is not depressing, it is just the nature of things.

P is true is just fancy talk for P. — Pie

This is just not true. P paints a propositional picture. By stating P, in some languages and contexts, it might be assumed that the same speech act is also affirming the propositional picture as being true(whatever that means). In other languages or contexts it might be assumed that P is short for "consider P", "it might be that P", etc.

Three things must be distinguished:

1. The spoken/written sentence
2. The proposition the listener/reader derives from 1
3. The state of affairs relevant to 2.

Truthhood obtains to 2 alone. 1 is inherently ambiguous, and is not in itself true or false.

Are scrawlings on a page or vibrations in the air true? Absurd, this is an obvious category error. They are symbols, only their interpretations can be true or false.

9. Sentient life has a tendency to destroy itself. — praxis

From the perspective of our point in history this possibility has a huge appeal. Especially when you consider that it can be argued that prior civilizations mostly or uniformly ended as a result of environmental degradation (see Collapse by Jared Diamond). Prior civilizations were local, but with our current global civilization, the collapse will also be global.

There is a basic problem: before a civilization can attain interstellar travel it must endure a period of time where it has the capability to destroy it's host planets capacity to sustain it. We are in that period now. As we now understand to are regret, restraining that capability is not so easy. Will we reach even one exoplanet before we destroy our own? It seems unlikely.

Truth only ever admits of degrees... of truth. — Banno

Not sure what this formulation is supposed to mean.

If what is suggested is an attempt to escape truth, then it fails. — Banno

Whew, glad I never once hinted at suggesting that.

So... that's partially true? — Banno

Sure, in some contexts, propositional logic for instance, truth is binary.

Your argument, of course, applies to your own remarks, and so if it undermines everything, it undermines itself. — Banno

So it cannot be the state of affairs that truth has degrees, because if it did, it would be impossible to state that truth had degrees? Sophomoric argument.

In the real world we get by just fine without running around proclaiming absolute truths and falsities. My post is no different. To attempt to pigeonhole all propositions into T and F is to miss almost all the nuance of actual communication.

The issue though is whether truth is a property in the first place. — Pie

If truth can admit to degrees, which it does, then it must be a property.

I use P as a symbol for the semantic payload of 'P'. — Pie

There is not one definite semantic payload corresponding to a given sentence.

I think that they sometimes to, due to ambiguity primarily. But let us differentiate carefully here between imperfectly true statements (fuzzy logic, etc.) and the confidence we have in our beliefs. — Pie

What's special about our confident beliefs?

Language is nothing if not ambiguous. Statements may be true, within a temporal window. They may be true, only within certain spatial coordninates. They may be true from some physical or mental perspectives, but not others. They may be true within the framework of some cultures and ideologies, but not others. They may be true in some perfectly legitimate interpretations, and false in other perfectly legitimate interpretations.

Even trivial toy examples, "The sky is blue", admit to this ambiguity. In one sense it is true. Yet is the sky itself a blue object in the way other blue objects are? No, the blue is a result of light scattering in the atmosphere, in a manner totally unlike blue objects in our everyday experience.

P is true is just fancy talk for P. This is the 'redundancy' theory. — Pie

But truth, like most things, is not binary. Sentences have degrees of truth. Absolute truth is an edge case.

Therefore, P cannot be the same thing as P is true. P in itself cannot express the range of degrees the truth property of P can take.

Truth is just one property of P. It's semantic contents, its aesthetic appeal, the number of words, the language and dialect, are other properties of P.

P is the proposition, 'P is true' is a comment on P's property of truth.

just as you who are experiencing them are also interpreting them
for yourself — Joshs

But this is the opposite process. My emotions are immediate to me, what you call interpreting is encoding them symbolically into language. This encoding is a necessary step to use the emotion in symbolic thought. If I can't encode then I can't think about them. In the same way, without my conscious intervention my body encodes my emotions into the symbology of expression and body language.

Whereas you immediately perceive only symbols of my inner state: my face, body, and words.

You see the symbols of my emotions, I encode my emotions into symbols.

and as a result we directly perceive ( without simulation) a version of the other’s intentions , — Joshs

This is the part of your account I find objectionable. We cannot directly perceive someone else's internal state. There is a layer of indirection between the other's state and our perceptions.

Facial expressions are not emotions, they are configurations of facial muscles. They are alsosymbols that point to emotions. A sneer is a symbol which has an emotive meaning, and is the English symbol "contempt" in another medium.

We can only "read" another's expressions and body language and spoken language, it is all reading. The fact that it seems immediate does not negate that it is an interpretive act. This interpretive facility must exist for it's failure as Autism to also exist.

But the religious don't even base morality on religion. Rather, they use religious text as a very motivated Rorschach test, and then stamp the resulting interpretation with the authority of that same text.

There are 10^183 planck length unit volumes in the universe. Might this be nmax?

it is an elaboration of organizational and functional characteristics of all living systems. — Joshs

This path ends in the absurdity of the conscious paramecium or Roomba, and furthermore cannot account for the fact that our own conscious awareness is just the tip of the iceberg of unconscious processes.

Calculations in physics. The Lorentz factor is unbounded. — jgill

The equation is unbounded. But is it unbounded in this universe? We cannot accelerate an object arbitrarily near to c, since that requires arbitrarily high amounts of energy, which is not available.

the observable universe is far too small to contain an ordinary digital representation of Graham's number, assuming that each digit occupies one Planck volume, possibly the smallest measurable space. But even the number of digits in this digital representation of Graham's number would itself be a number so large that its digital representation cannot be represented in the observable universe. Nor even can the number of digits of that number—and so forth, for a number of times far exceeding the total number of Planck volumes in the observable universe.

That last part... holy shit!
:strong: :wink:

:scream:

I don't see the difference. Sorry, I just don't. — noAxioms

I am truly, genuinely curious as to what is going on here. Is there a conceptual difference, so that we are talking past each other? Some kind of difference in cognitive style? Do you enjoy an intuitive clarity about consciousness most of us lack? Are you a p zombie?

Let's proceed in the spirit of inquiry, rather than rancorous debate.

A few questions:

Are you able to visualize? Can you create a picture of something, say a beach, on command in your head? Some people lack this ability entirely. I can do it, but the quality is poor.

Can you imagine sounds? I can do this quite well, with great clarity.

Can you imagine touch and other body sensations? I can do this, but here the imagination is easily confused with the real thing, this had lead to very serious psychosomatic problems when I was younger.

What about taste and smell? I actually cannot imagine these, at all.

How do you think? I think primarily by talking to myself. I "hear" my voice in constant dialogue with myself. This dialogue is supplemented with flickery images of poor quality, which are nonetheless a huge help. I was surprised to learn that this is not at all universal. Some people think exclusively with speech or images, some with emotions, some apparently do not use sensory media at all, and think in pure concepts. I think there are more ways I cannot remember.

You completely misunderstood, this is all just background I made up for my hypothetical question. No scientists in question, no such structure has been discovered. — hypericin

Damn, I wish I added, "I would not care because I am a p zombie"

Are you making this up or did the scientists in question actually say this? Did they actually say this structure is responsible for the kind of consciousness that the dualists are talking about? — noAxioms

You completely misunderstood, this is all just background I made up for my hypothetical question. No scientists in question, no such structure has been discovered.

You suggest that some people are zombies, but balk when I suggest I'm probably one of them since I don't see the problem that others do so clearly. — noAxioms

In reality I would be very surprised if zombies existed. I think it is much more likely that there is a cognitive difference which makes this concept more difficult for some people.

A device with a camera sees red if it in any way reacts to the data instead of just storing it like a camera does. — noAxioms

A digital camera doesn't just store it, there are a multitude of processes which must occur before the light can be stored digitally. Correcting for red eye is just another transformation.

By what definition? It's not human, sure, and that's the usual definition. — noAxioms

That is not the usual definition. The usual is something more like "private internal perception". A camera or a computer can respond behaviorally to it's red sensors in essentially the same way you can to yours. But (we presume) only you have an accompanying subjective experience of red.

Try to describe what it is like to experience red to a blind person. You can use adjectives like "warm", "excitable", etc, but that is about as far as you can go. The internal experience is completely private, and completely incommunicable.

If indeed you lack this, this must sound like gibberish.

Ah, but I'm behaving differently, and true zombies apparently must lie about this sort of thing. — noAxioms

People cite this "no behavioral difference" as if it were some kind of iron law of p zombies, instead of a completely arbitrary stipulation in Chalmers's own thought experiment. In reality, if p zombies did exist, you would expect a behavioral difference of some sort, even if it were the kind of impairment that would only reveal itself in testing.

Exactly what evidence was collected to suggest this conclusion? — noAxioms

Even though behaviorally it makes no difference, subjects might report a difference who have this structure temporarily knocked out. Perhaps there is a lapse of phenomenal memory. This is not really the point of the OP however.

I've never been able to figure out what people have that a machine cannot. — noAxioms

It's always weird to me when someone makes this claim. A digital camera sees red, and processes the data coming from it's red sensors. But it has no experience. A computer is no different.