Expressions And Meanings - Part 3: Linguistic Relativism

But a big problem arises: Is there any concrete argument to say that Timmy [see part 1] expressed his ideas incorrectly?! Not really!! The matter of fact is that all languages are conventions. Thats to say, there is no good reason that the utterance "prime number" means [a number that is divisible only by two different numbers: itself and one]... This expression is valid to express that idea only because it was agreed that this utterance means that concept. There is no innate value to that utterance, or any concrete basis for the connection.

Hence, the judgment that Timmy expressed his idea in an incorrect manner is baseless, because there is no expression that is more correct for an idea. Thats true, but this is a fine line, and we need to pay attention to the difference between an expression and meaning.

Lets get back to the observer's POV. Timmy says: "666 is a prime number". From the observer's POV we have no access to the meaning, only the expression. So we must now attempt to interpret the utterance! But an expression can mean anything! Absolutely anything! If we don't interpret the utterance with the assumption of a particular language (for example, English) the utterance can basically mean anything! So in order to have a practical value for an expression, we must have some assumptions about the language this expression is constructed with. So, simply said, to interpret an expression we must have a reference language.

Can an observer say: "Timmy believes that 666 is a prime number. He also believes that prime numbers mean cool numbers." - Not really! We have already established that saying: "Timmy believes that 666 is a prime number" is not correct. And saying: "He also believes that prime numbers mean cool numbers" is again incorrect. He does not believe that the concept of primeness and coolness are synonymous. He only thinks that the utterance of 'prime number' and 'cool number' are synonymous. So when we say: "Timmy believes that 666 is a prime number", this is interpreted in our language not his, because its us who are making that utterance.

Consider the smart answer that Richard provided: I should have stipulated that Timmy intended to use his words in the same way as the rest of his speech community does (so when we tell him what the rest of us mean by 'prime number', he will respond, 'oops, my mistake').

That answer signifies an important realization: There is no right way or wrong way to express an idea, except in one case: When that expression has the goal of being correctly interpreted, and to communicate the idea that it means.

So we have two cases:

1. The speaker is NOT concerned how his expression is understood. The expression is taken to have value in and of itself. Here there are no qualifiers to the rightness or wrongness of an expression.
   
2. The speaker intends to convey an idea. The expression not the goal, the idea (meaning) is the goal. Here, it becomes important to express the idea in an understandable manner.

Then again, if we refer to what we have already established in Part 1, which is that meaning is the goal of an expression, we can say that most speakers fall in the case numbered (2) where it is important to express an idea in an understandable manner.

In this series:
Expressions And Meanings - Part 1: Introduction
Expressions And Meanings - Part 2: Elaboration
Expressions And Meanings - Part 3: Linguistic Relativism
Expressions And Meanings - Part 4: Conclusion

Slaves Until Things Change

This post was provoked by a fictional story about a fictional girl character who is a spinster. The theme [-that is relevant to this post-] is that this girl lives in a conservative society where pre-marital relationships are taboo. This girl is disconnected from the male-world for too long that she got to an age where she is no longer marriage material. This girl feels that she has been unfairly made into an outcast. At some point she says (and I quote): "I protected their honor. I played with their rules. I worked hard in silence to make everyone happy, and yet never been good enough." - This sentence provoked me by what I would consider extreme stupidity - the thing that I consider the greatest sin of all sins.

No one would respect an "ass-kisser"!! If someone spends his\her life trying to play by other people's rules, they become slaves. It doesn't need a genius to figure that the rules people make are self-interested. Each person makes the rules that serve them, and if someone else plays by those rules, they become slaves to the person/system who made those rules!!

Sure everyone loves to have a slave, but no-one respects a slave. And thats exactly whats going on: People make some rules about how a "nice" person behaves... And someone decides to be the "nice" person... And they get all the compliments... In case of our fictional character, it's the girl who is too busy being nice, because she is being called "honorable", "pure", and "chaste"... Or in other words: A good slave! A good slave who nobody wants to do anything with, except to keep her a slave for as long as possible!!

This fictional character was too busy being a humble slave that she forgets about herself. She thinks that when people applaud her, they applaud her for being a good person, when in fact they applaud her for being an ignorant person and a good slave! And not until later in her life the she understood the hypocrisy of the system that she was indulging in...

She argues: "I worked hard in silence to make everyone happy, and yet never been good enough.", oblivious to the fact that working hard to make everyone happy is exactly the reason why she has never been good enough... No slave is ever good enough, there are always more things that a slave needs to do to please his\her master! Heck, the argument itself seems like an "ass-kissing" attempt...

This spinster girl is also taken as a model for the topic of suppression of women. If we go the sexists' way, and model men and women as systems in and of themselves, we may say that each system has its own self-interesting rules that each wishes to enforce. It is generally thought that the men's system of rules are dominant. Under this assumption -which I actually don't think actually holds- it is said that women are suppressed by men. If men were suppressing women, for all I know, they should continue doing so, until women wake up from their nap! Its like a slave humbly asking his master to set him free... But this slave won't get his freedom by begging for it, but rather by fighting for it!

But in truth, this is not a case of one gender dominating the other... Each and everyone of us -who wishes to be free- needs to fight... No slave is set free by a begging! It has been said: "People are born free!" which is true, the question is: "Why did they sell themselves to slavery?!"

It's easier said than done, but I think we should stop for a second and ask ourselves: Do I want to be an ass-kisser?! Will ass-kissing get me anywhere beside being eventually neglected?!

Viva La Revolution!

PS: This post does NOT reflect the original character in the aforementioned story. The character was purposefully taken out-of-context for the purpose of making this post!
PS: Here is an alternative link to the story

Expressions And Meanings - Part 2: Elaboration

Going back to Timmy [see part 1], Timmy says (utters): "666 is a prime number"... What he means to say is: "666 is a cool number"... Lets take things from an observer's POV [POV: point of view]: When hearing Timmy saying "666 is a prime number", it is obvious that Timmy is saying something wrong. From an observer's POV, we have no knowledge to qualify the beliefs of Timmy as true or false, simply because we can't go inside Timmy's head to learn what he means, we only know what he said, and he said something that is obviously wrong!

Can an observer say: "Timmy believes that he believes that 666 is a prime number".... As tempting as it seems to say that, this is not true. Read what the aforementioned blog entry has to say:

What of Timmy's meta-beliefs? He might not have any, if he's very young, but let's suppose that he's aware of himself as a believing agent. What does he think he believes? Jack suggests to me the following: "Timmy believes that he believes that 666 is a prime number". But this attribution seems mistaken for exactly the same reasons. Timmy lacks the concept prime number, so he can't have any (even meta-) beliefs involving it. And nor can he have any de re beliefs about primeness (under whatever guise), because he lacks any alternative grasp of the property in question. He's not capable of having primeness feature in his mental content at all. (source)

Timmy does NOT believe that 666 is a prime number. He says what would conventionally suggest that he does, but he doesn't mean what he is saying. He believes that 666 is a cool number. His mistake is that he thinks that the utterance "666 is a prime number" expresses the idea that 666 is a cool number, oblivious to that the utterance "666 is a prime number" conventionally means that 666 is divisible by only itself and 1.... He may and may not believe that 666 is divisible only by itself and 1, but his utterance is simply unmeant to this concept.

In this series:
Expressions And Meanings - Part 1: Introduction
Expressions And Meanings - Part 2: Elaboration
Expressions And Meanings - Part 3: Linguistic Relativism
Expressions And Meanings - Part 4: Conclusion

Expressions And Meanings - Part 1: Introduction

In this series, I will ponder on case-scenario suggested by a fellow blogger:

Suppose young Timmy mistakenly takes 'prime number' to be roughly synonymous with 'cool number'. So he goes around saying things like '666 is a prime number'. Does he believe that 666 is a prime number? Presumably not. He certainly doesn't have a de dicto belief involving the concept prime number, since he lacks this concept (he associates the words, 'prime number', with a different concept entirely). Nor does he have any de re beliefs about primes, i.e. beliefs which talk about this property under a different guise: he does not believe, for example, that 666 is divisible only by itself and 1. What Timmy believes is that 666 is a cool number (or, more likely yet, that '666' is a cool numeral), and he mistakenly takes the sentence '666 is a prime number' to express this belief. (source)

As we can see an utterance (an expression) has a meaning behind it. Usually, meanings are the goal and expressions are merely means to achieve that goal. Thats why, it is important that when we hear an expression, we analyze it and start digging for the meaning behind that expression.

The problem is, as humans we are incapable of communicating meanings, we are only capable of communicating expressions. This realization leads to The Problem of Representation (aka representational skepticism) that I have discussed before.

Lingual skepticism and other forms of skepticism like brains in a vat skepticism, and The Matrix skepticism are closely related. They all go around the limitations of empiricism, and the limitations of our senses to grasp reality.

In this series:
Expressions And Meanings - Part 1: Introduction
Expressions And Meanings - Part 2: Elaboration
Expressions And Meanings - Part 3: Linguistic Relativism
Expressions And Meanings - Part 4: Conclusion

God Is Watching

If you masturbate, you must learn that masturbation is an abomination, and the "Veggie Fables" have the right song for you:

God is watching everything you do
When you get undressed or take a shower
When you touch yourself for hour after hour
God is watching everything you do

And He thinks you're a nasty, naughty nympho slut!
You sinful filthy whore you're going to hell!
Your flesh will burn, your bones will churn
Your soul will be torn asunder

You wretched heathen heretic, burn in hell
..... For eternity!
So you better remember!
God is watching everything you do! (source)

My Philosophy

"My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute."

Ayn Rand

Amen to that!