This is all cockeyed though because language use is a cooperative game, not a competitive one. — Srap Tasmaner
(I know I will be nearing a profound truth when you ask a 500 word question and I am able to give a 5 word answer.) — RussellA
If our linguistic competence and/or ability were limited to those three aforementioned principles, we could not ever know what the speaker meant, as compared/contrasted to what they said [in malapropisms]... but we do.
Did I miss anything important with regard to the odd success of malapropisms? — creativesoul
It's about what Davidson missed. — creativesoul
Note that the explanation I offered for the odd success of malapropisms eliminated Davidson's notions of prior theory and passing theory. — creativesoul
1. Davidson's principles (1) - (3) are a good description of lexical meaning.
2. Davidson's argument shows that (1) - (3) cannot account for linguistic behavior.
Therefore
3. We lose nothing by giving up the idea of lexical meaning. — Srap Tasmaner
An interpreter’s prior theory has a better chance of describing what we might think of as a natural language, particularly a prior theory brought to a first conversation. The less we know about the speaker, assuming we know he belongs to our language community, the more nearly our prior theory will simply be the theory we expect someone who hears our unguarded speech to use. (262)
And we should try again to say how convention in any important sense is involved in language; or, as I think, weshould give up the attempt to illuminate how we communicate by appeal to conventions. (265)
Why should a passing theory be called a theory at all? For the sort of theory we have in mind is, in its formal structure, suited to be the theory for an entire language, even though its expected field of application is vanishingly small. The answer is that when a word or phrase temporarily or locally takes over the role of some other word or phrase (as treated in a prior theory, perhaps), the entire burden of that role, with all its implications for logical relations to other words, phrases, and sentences, must be carried along by the passing theory. Someone who grasps the fact that Mrs Malaprop means ‘epithet’ when she says ‘epitaph’ must give ‘epithet’ all the powers ‘epitaph’ has for many other people. Only a full recursive theory can do justice to these powers. These remarks do not depend on supposing Mrs Malaprop will always make this ‘mistake’; once is enough to summon up a passing theory assigning a new role to ‘epitaph’. — pp. 261 - 262
The widespread existence of malapropisms and their kin threatens the distinction, since here the intended meaning seems to take over from the standard meaning. — p. 252
A lot of the milk into town and it was pretty crestfallen when you want or go on the road. — Srap Tasmaner
reinforces the point that language does not rely on rules. — Banno
What's the relationship between "first/literal meaning" and "lexical meaning"? — Dawnstorm
I expect that rigid structure to be some sort of ideal type of a structuring principle; something people use to both create utterances and compare other people's utterances to, and something that will on occasion fail: people make mistakes, people don't find the words to express what they want to say and approximate with the best words they can find (and on failure to communicate try alternate ways of expressing themselves)... and so on. — Dawnstorm
I take "passing theory" to mean a non-canonical, no literal interpretation of a sentence or text, a creative, sui generis interpretation that may be required to understand each instance of malapropism. When a sentence does not compute within correct language conventions, one searches for an alternative explanation, a 'theory' of what happened in this particular malapropism — Olivier5
So you are saying that intentional states are not directed at things in the world, but at Aristotelian universals that are mental objects? — Banno
Malapropisms break the rules of conventional language use — creativesoul
Can we not reduce all this to the simple necessity that language is prior to any language theory? — unenlightened
Of course the term 'passing theory' is a bit pompous. You can translate it by "one's understanding of what happened". — Olivier5
Malapropisms break the rules of conventional language use
— creativesoul
It seems that, in his article "A Nice Derangement of Epitaphs"
1) Davidson doesn't define what he means by "conventions", but infers a particular definition of "conventions".
2) He concludes by inferring that because his particular definition of "conventions" is not illuminative - then no definition of "conventions" will be illuminative. — RussellA
It seems pretty clear though that (3) there, the ideal we're aware of, is not the same thing as (2), — Srap Tasmaner
...and where (1) fits in is unclear. — Srap Tasmaner
The structure of (2) we are largely unaware of, so it's more likely that (3) is something else that (2) generates alongside linguistic behavior. And (3) can readily grow from simple correctness to the art of rhetoric.
But maybe it goes in the other direction! — Srap Tasmaner
The way I see it, it's a work in progress, annotations and remarks and caveats and entirely new entries get added from time to time, when we note a particular way of speaking ("Alfred keeps saying "obviously" all the time, that could mean something... but what?"), or when we understand a malapropism ("that lady is mixing up complicated words"), or catch a speech impairment ("he can't say "ask", that's why he's always "axing"), or when we learn a new word. It's a long list of "notes to self about language".Simply put, it seems clear to me that the notions of 'prior' and 'passing' theory are the result of not quite having a good enough grasp upon what language is, and how it works. — creativesoul
(C) If his argument is valid, and we reject views well-described by his three principles, are there other approaches out there that handle malapropisms better? — Srap Tasmaner
Simply put, it seems clear to me that the notions of 'prior' and 'passing' theory are the result of not quite having a good enough grasp upon what language is, and how it works.
— creativesoul
The way I see it, it's a work in progress... — Olivier5
that it's able to evolve as it does. — creativesoul
At the core of every system capable of evolving, one can usually... — Olivier5
That's not good enough for what I'm getting at. — creativesoul
There's this idea of a language war between descriptivists and prescriptivists, but that would give you two insane positions: either "there are no mistakes," or "usage doesn't matter". Basically, you just navigate a linguistic landscape, accept some rules (and maybe internalise them, or maybe just pay lipservice), and discard others (maybe as a deliberate choice, or because your word habits are too strong and you just forget). Rules can be internalised from (3) into (2), and (1) can make hypotheses about when that happens (but I'm not sure how good (1) is at that currently). — Dawnstorm
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