This raises the question of what it is that is shared. — Banno
But if we do say this, then we should realize that we have abandoned not only the ordinary notion of a language, but we have erased the boundary between knowing a language and knowing our way around in the world generally. For there are no rules for arriving at passing theories, no rules in any strict sense, as opposed to rough maxims and methodological generalities — p. 265
One pertinent question is whether semantic meaning grew out of psychological meaning, or is semantic meaning of a different kind to psychological meaning. — RussellA
psychological meaning which seems in opposition to semantic meaning — Isaac
Without words, what is it that you're referring to the meaning of — Isaac
What's an "instantiated mental act" — Banno
Yes, in which case the article does not hold its argument. The article sets out to shoe that (3) is false.(i) We have a linguistic competence that allows us to deal with malapropisms and their kin, and this competence is adequately described by Davidson's principles (1) - (3). — Srap Tasmaner
Yep. This is perhaps the first reading of the article; work out what principle we need to add.(ii) We have a linguistic competence that allows us to deal with malapropisms and their kin, and this competence is not adequately described by Davidson's principles (1) - (3). (Some principle must be added, or one of these principles must be modified.) — Srap Tasmaner
Is this that Davidson's principles are inadequate? If so, yes, and this seems to me to be were we should be heading, and were Davidson ends up. Your quote reminds me of the end of On the very idea of a conceptual scheme,(iii) We have some other competence that allows us to deal with malapropisms and their kin, not linguistic and thus not adequately described by Davidson's principles (1) - (3), which describes a linguistic competence, whether or not it describes all possible linguistic competence. — Srap Tasmaner
Hence my questions to @Isaac and to @RussellA.In giving up the dualism of scheme and world, we do not give up the world, but reestablish unmediated touch with the tfamiliarobjects whose antics make our sentences and opinions true or false.
The stuff of mine you responded to, that was supposed to be uncontroversial summary. — Srap Tasmaner
but as long as you take seriously... — Srap Tasmaner
The problem we have been grappling with depends on the assumption that communication by speech requires that speaker and interpreter have learned or somehow acquired a common method or theory of interpretation—as being able to operate on the basis of shared conventions, rules, or regularities. The problem arose when we realized that no method or theory fills this bill. The solution to the problem is clear. In linguistic communication nothing corresponds to a linguistic competence as often described: that is, as summarized by principles (1)–(3). The solution is to give up the principles. Principles (1) and (2) survive when understood in rather unusual ways, but principle (3) cannot stand, and it is unclear what can take its place. I conclude that there is no such thing as a language, not if a language is anything like what many philosophers and linguists have supposed. There is therefore no such thing to be learned, mastered, or born with. We must give up the idea of a clearly defined shared structure which language-users acquire and then apply to cases. And we should try again to say how convention in any important sense is involved in language; or, as I think, we should give up the attempt to illuminate how we communicate by appeal to conventions.
SO drop the notion of a share meaning. — Banno
I don't think that's the conclusion. The question as to the extent that Davidson repudiated his previous approach remains open at the end of this article. I'd rephrase it as that lexical meaning - convention - is insufficient; that language is more than following conventions.3. We lose nothing by giving up the idea of lexical meaning. — Srap Tasmaner
What evidence is there that we model the world? Or better, what sort of thing is that model taken to be? It's apparent that there are philosophers of sorts that think all we have access to is our model of the world. That's not what psychology thinks, is it?
Can you commend any decent tertiary texts on this? — Banno
We want a deeper notion of what words, when spoken in context, mean; and like the shallow notion of correct usage, we want the deep concept to distinguish between what a speaker, on a given occasion, means, and what his words mean. The widespread existence of malapropisms and their kin threatens the distinction, since here the intended meaning seems to take over from the standard meaning...
...It’s high noon someone beat him at his own game, but I have never done it; cross my eyes and hope to die, he always wins thumbs down...
It seems unimportant, so far as understanding is concerned, who makes a mistake, or whether there is one...
The concept(first meaning) applies to words and sentences as uttered by a particular speaker on a particular occasion. But if the occasion, the speaker, and the audience are ‘normal’ or ‘standard’ (in a sense not to be further explained here), then the first meaning of an utterance will be what should be found by consulting a dictionary based on actual usage (such as Webster’s Third)
A better way to distinguish first meaning is through the intentions of the speaker...
...Because a speaker necessarily intends first meaning to be grasped by his audience, and it is grasped if communication succeeds...
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