Philosophers of language are not much concerned with what individual words or sentences mean. The nearest dictionary or encyclopedia may solve the problem of the meaning of words, and to speak a language correctly is generally to know what most sentences mean. What is more interesting for philosophers is the question of what it means for an expression to mean something. Why do expressions have the meanings they have? Which expressions have the same meaning as other expressions, and why? How can these meanings be known? And the best, and simplest, question might be, "what does the word 'meaning' mean?"
In a similar vein, philosophers wonder about the relationship between meaning and truth. Philosophers tend to be less concerned with which sentences are actually true, and more with what kinds of meanings can be true or false. Some examples of questions a truth-oriented philosopher of language might ask include: Can meaningless sentences be true or false? What about sentences about things that don't exist? Is it sentences that are true or false, or is it the usage of sentences?
Language, how things 'mean' something, and truth are important not just because they are used in everyday life; language shapes human development, from earliest childhood and continuing to death. Knowledge itself may be intertwined with language. Notions of self, experience, and existence may depend entirely on how language is used and what is learned through it.
The topic of learning language leads to all kinds of interesting questions. Is it possible to have any thoughts without having a language? What kinds of thoughts need a language to happen? How much does language influence knowledge of the world and how one acts in it? Can anyone reason at all without using language?
I think the meaning of a expression comes first, and it can exist without the need of a language. Although we need language to express this meaning. So expressions are like symbols that we must use to better understand the meanings, or to organize them in a way we could deal with them. Thats why expressions have the meaning they have, because we associate the meanings with the respective expressions, for example, there is the "concept of quantity" that we can associate to the word number or quantity. We canīt deal directly with the concepts so we must use symbols.
"Which expressions have the same meaning as other expressions, and why?"
There is a lot of expressions with the same meaning like "quantity", and "number", or like "1+1" and "2". Words are just symbols, there is no problem if some of them have the same meaning. But thats a interesting question, many people confuse meaning with language, so if there is a problem with the used language, they are leaded to think that there is no meaning in that. Like a friend of mine, and my father, they canīt understand things which canīt be expressed in a very easy simplistic way, if you get too much philosophical they think it has no meaning, or when you confuse yourself in the language you fail to express something, and people use it to show you that you have no point.
"What does the word 'meaning' mean?"
I donīt know, maybe to give importance to something, like if to say that something has a meaning is the same as to say that it can affect us somehow. If it means something to you, it is because it affects you that way. Meaningless things being those "things" that donīt exist. But I think I need to improve this definition.
"Can meaningless sentences be true or false? What about sentences about things that don't exist? Is it sentences that are true or false, or is it the usage of sentences?"
I think meaningless is when you make a bad usage of language, you are not trying to represent a meaning by the use of language you just wrote random jibberish. I donīt think meaningless sentences can be true, or false because it is meanings which can be true, or false not sentences themselves. Sentences just carry a meaning.
"Is it possible to have any thoughts without having a language? Can anyone reason at all without using language?"
Thatīs a hard question, but I think it is possible to have thoughts without the use of language. I think thats what intuition does, we can have information about something without have used a "language reasoning" yet, or when "language reasoning" prevent us to acquire information about what we are studying. We can guess the result of a equation without resolving it using mathemathical language.
"How much does language influence knowledge of the world and how one acts in it?"
Language is a tool for we use to understand the world, but it has it limitations, languages use logic, and logic(the mathematical logic, aristotelic logic... that kind of logic) is proved to be limited in a way we canīt use it to get all the answers. I think that maybe intuition is what is needed to get those answers.
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Last edited by Atlantis001 on Aug 10th, 2005 at 03:45 PM
Language is the glue of communication. Regardless of whether it is verbal or physical, the use of language is our means of making sense of the world in an empathatic sense. It also a means of qualifying and understanding previous experiences. David Crystal has some very interesting thoughts on this, if you're interested...
__________________ Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made;
Those are pearls that were his eyes:
Nothing of him that doth fade
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
In a neuropsychology class I saw a video of a woman in the latter stages of Alzheimer's. When you read a phrase she had spoken on paper, it sounded like gibberish, but when you watched her as she spoke, to me at least, it made sense and I could perceive what she meant, though the words made no sense.
If one does not have language, how does one think? is it possible to think beyond the restrictions of words to define your reality?
I happen to believe in evolution. What would have created that evolutionary leap from no language to having language? Does the invention of language go hand in hand with the intellegence of human thought? If other animals do not have language, how do they think? Do other animials think in the same ways as that of a human child?
In a wider sense, what is the core human element that makes us seperated from our animal ancestors and what caused it?
__________________ The Revolution will not be Televised
I think it is possible to know the reality without the need of a language, we create models, and paradigms to explain reality but its true meaning is something that cannot be expressed, it is a like intuition, a sensation. Explain blue to me. You could try to write a text explaining what blue is, but you can only know it when you see it. Like Morpheus said... I cannot tell what matrix is, you must see it for yourself.
Animals are not totally disproved of language, they just not use words, but they make logical reasoning at some level, they donīt solve differential equations, but they do some quite nice tricks, never heard of Alex, the parrot. He can tell what a material is, its color, its quantity, and recognizes his name written.
I think what separates us from animals is a better reasoning, and intelligence that many of us have, and the possibility of not letting our instincs dictates our behavior(free will), what is something that we are still developing.
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Last edited by Atlantis001 on Aug 29th, 2005 at 10:56 PM
okay, just because one can not think in words, doesn't mean we can not think at all. There are images and sensory memory, People can learn and feel and think with out being able to speak. Speaking/Language is only one way of communication. If someone really wanted to communicate they could use pictures and images and objects.
Secondly I don't believe in Evolution I believe in Creationism. God made Animals, God made Humans. Yes humans do have some things in common with lower class animals such as natural selection, but alot of animals/people are also effected by enviormental ques. I don't want this to turn into a Psychology discussion so I wont get into the whole Nature Vs. Nurture. But just a thought : Dogs Cant speak, yet Pavlov(sp?) taught his dogs to salivate to a sound of the bell, Little Albert (an infant) leanered to be afraid of a white rat because Watson would make a loud bang when ther child was present with the white rat. My point is, just because one does not understand language or cant speak does not mean he/she can not think. People will learn who to communicate and get by. My examples above show association. The Person like Albert learned not to trust the rat (due to a frighting sound). The Dogs associated the food with the sound of a bell. People can survive without language in my opinion
I do not deny the ability for that non speaking creatures have for thought. However I do not understand how one can think to ones self withought thinking in words, how does this work? How does one say something to ones selfe if one cannot describe with words? I am not denying, I am simply questioning. On other terms, please do not use God as the anchor of your answers, because God is simply and idea which we as humans invented through language.
__________________ The Revolution will not be Televised
everyone can think it doesn't have to be with thoughts, it could be with pictures or other things. all animals on the planet communicate and talk in thier own way, and I would only assums that they think similar to a way we do.
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Not always. Example; sometimes I can't remember a phone number, but if I have a phone in front of me I can dial it. The number is stored in the movement of my hand.
It's been said that transplant patients often have cravings of thoughts they never had before the transplant...Thought could also be connected down at the cellular level.
Here's another thought...It seems today science is beginning to accept spirituality..Edgar Morin director of research for the National Center for Scientific Research in Paris had this to say.
From this point on, while the materialists continue to call the mind an epiphenomenon, the spiritual oriented people try to conceive of the brain as sort of network that captures "trans material" messages which are transmitted in a psychic or information field..The brain does not "Produce" the mind but "detects" it. The information that penetrates the senses "materializes" itself in chemical substances and neuronal changes, which register physical the symbolic meaning of sensory perception...etc......
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Aug 10th, 2005 11:47 AM
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