The structure of meaning.

[peter]

What holds up the structure of meaning of words.

If I define a given word, I use other words to do so, their own definitions having to be set in their own turn at some other point in time. No matter how far in a given language you go, you can never escape this chain of definitions, and sooner or later it is bound to be circular. So you ultimately finish up with an interlocking system of meanings that only holds together by the relationship between each individual part and the whole - almost like the individual stone bricks that prop each other up in an arch. But has this almost spherical framework of interlocking definitions any solid core?

I can't help but feel that in some way this must be important in an ...... epistemological (?) ...... sense. I can't say in what way, but something tells me that it is.

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

Is this s'posed to be some sort of Structuralism vs. Poststructualism Throwdown?

I demur to any Promethean dream reducing meaning to an abstract, nonhuman factor.

If one wants to know the structure of meaning, one merely needs to take a gander in the mirror. Only the human spirit grasps/makes meaning through immediate illumination. When one can't grasp the meaning, everything is dark and obscure. But when the meaning finally comes, it arrives in a flash. Eureka!

If I might, I'd recommend one of the, IMO, best nonreductive, Realist accounts of meaning: Collected Works of Bernard Lonergan Vol. 3: Insight: A Study of Human Understanding.

It asks three basic questions ...

1. What am I doing when I am knowing? (Cognitional Theory)
2. Why is doing that knowing? (Epistemology)
3. What do I know when I do it? (Metaphysics)

'One of the great philosophical treatises of the century'
-- E.F. O'Doherty, Studies

'A great book ... a grand tour of the human mind in its characteristic activity of insight on all levels and in all its main fields of application.'
-- W. Norris Clarke, Woodstock Letters

'It shows an astonishingly wide knowledge of diverse fields of human thought, including mathematics, physics, and psychology.'
-- Frederick C. Copleston, Journal of Theological Studies



My .

[peter]

The question is a simple (and most probably meaningless) but genuine one on my part Wos.

I've got to be honest, I'm not going to loose a lot of sleep over it - but it simply seems that when I think about it, all definitions of words, and by extension what we understand about them, are simply proped up by further definitions.......... like a big circle of people all leaning forward at an impossible angle, just proped up by virtue of the people in front of them, but ultimately coming back round to the point where those people (definitions) are supported by the ones you first started with.

If this idea is considered as a framework of interlocking meaning, is it then a fragile or a strong framework? If you were an engineer looking at it, would you see it as a rock-solid construction - a foundation worthy of basing an understanding of what constitutes true knowledge about being, about what and where we (I) truly find ourselves (myself). Or would it be a weak thing, subject to collapse, fundamentally flawed as a tool for understanding - and is it thus the case that true knowledge will never be obtained via the medium of words/language, but rather in some (perhaps) epiphanous insight that the words will simply point the way to, but will not be part of themselves.

Forgive me....... I ramble! Best just to leave me to it, but thanks for the reading suggestion; not I'm thinking, perhaps a bit of light material to be dipped into before bed, but one which requires a certain amount of 'girding up of loins' to tackle. I sit here, living proof that because the man who sits before you is in the pose of Rodin's Thinker, it doesn't mean he isn't thinking about last night's episode of The Simpson's!



(But more seriously - thanks again for the recommendation; that looks like a seriously good book covering a range of ways of looking at the subject. I'll definitely keep my eye open for a copy and if it appears 'accesable' enough for someone at my level, give it a whirl.)

[Wosbald]

+JMJ+

[...]

I've got to be honest, I'm not going to loose a lot of sleep over it - but it simply seems that when I think about it, all definitions of words, and by extension what we understand about them, are simply proped up by further definitions.......... like a big circle of people all leaning forward at an impossible angle, just proped up by virtue of the people in front of them, but ultimately coming back round to the point where those people (definitions) are supported by the ones you first started with.

[...]

This is a very good image, but methinks it needs a little tweaking.

Firstly, lemme digress a bit by saying that my early point was, basically, that all of the reductive searches for meaning (Structuralist, Poststructuralist, etc.) try to capture the essence (or "core", as you say) of meaning as being some basic element extraneous to the human realm. Some isolable nonhuman determinant of what we call meaning.

Getting back to your image, if you want to know about the "core" which supports meaning, then the imaginative illustration you conjure above is very vivid and quite useful. However, instead of having the people in the circle leaning one-on-the other along the circumference of the circle, picture them all leaning inward towards the center of the circle -- towards the "core".

Now, imagine that "core" being you. Your intellect. It is you who supports, identifies, and conjuncts all of the elements of meaning surrounding and mutually leaning on you for support. Unless, perhaps, you were to lose your mind (Heaven forfend! ) and scatter all of those inwardly-leaning elements to the Four Winds, then the structure is unshakably "strong" and "rock-solid".

The elements of meaning are most certainly not leaning on each other, as if they could stand all-by-their-lonesome.

[Avatar]

No, there is no solid core.

Meaning has to be shared to actually be meaning. It only works if both people have the same understanding of the concepts / whatever.

All of philosophy is a search for accurate definition. If you don't have it, and it's not shared, then you are not talking about the same things, even if you think you are.

Everything is subjective.

--A

[Zarathustra]

Pete, your sense that this is very important/fundamental is correct. There is a rich history to this question in the history of philosophy. I would advise against studying any particular philosopher in isolation of this rich historical context, and start at the "beginning" to get an overview of just how complex this question is. [And I'd certainly ignore reading minor philosophers who are recommended solely on the basis that they are a priest, which seems to be Wos's primary and overriding criterion no matter which subject we're discussing, whether politics or philosophy.]

Start here: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/meaning/

I think part of the trouble of grasping at this question is just formulating the question itself. For instance, are you *sure* you're asking about the structure of meaning? I think this is what prompted Wos's "structuralism vs poststructuralism" response. The question itself implies structuralism, though you may not even know what that term means (I'm assuming).

It seems you are asking, "what is meaning?" Or, "how do our words carry/convey meaning?" It is certainly more than a circle of definitions, as you've suggested. A dictionary doesn't even convey syntax, much less the source of semantics. Language is a human activity, not a list of definitions. The meaning of words changes not only when you change the order and/or grammatical function in which they are used (syntax), but also in the activities and social/cultural contexts in which they are used. If you asked, "Can you pass the salt?" only a smartass would respond, "Of course I can" and then continue eating as if the matter were settled--even though the response is grammatically correct, meaningful, and literally relevant. The question isn't a literal query of one's abilities, but a request for a favor. No dictionary or definition of these words will ever tell you that, and yet even illiterate children know the difference. This is because the meaning is only revealed in how the phrase is used in human activities. (Wittgenstein called these "language games.")

That's not to say that words don't/can't have specific meanings. But what are these meanings? It's not simply a one-to-one relationship between signifier and signified. Nor is it always symbol vs something in the world. Words can refer to things that don't even exist, and we still know what they mean.

The question is simply too complex not to first research which question you're trying to ask, and discovering all the ramifications of simply asking it. It reveals entire systems of thought and competing schools of thought (like most basic questions in philosophy).

[Zarathustra]

No, there is no solid core.

I think there's a "core," but it might not be solid. Maybe its a liquid or gas.

All of philosophy is a search for accurate definition. If you don't have it, and it's not shared, then you are not talking about the same things, even if you think you are.

I wouldn't say "all" of philosophy. Surely a great deal of it is defining things, but it is also the search for the right starting point/questions, and discovering which assumptions we already carried with us in asking those questions.

Meaning has to be shared to actually be meaning. It only works if both people have the same understanding of the concepts / whatever.

. . .

Everything is subjective.

--A

These two together form a contradiction. How can *everything* be subjective if meaning has to be shared to be meaning? Communication is one of the ways that we transcend our subjectivity. Sure, you can call it "inter-subjective," but even this ignores objective meaning, such as that found in science or mathematics. The truth of mathematical theorems doesn't rely upon anyone understanding them. We discover this meaning, not invent it. If we invented it, mathematics could be whatever we want. We can construct whatever sentences we want, but we can't write whatever mathematical theorems that we want. The latter are constrained by an objective, preexisting meaning that transcends our subjectivity and would be true in any possible world.

And our scientific explanations, in as much as they are true, explain some objective feature of the world, not a subjective impression. Experience is used to verify our theories, but our theories are not true in virtue of this verification. They are true in as much as they elucidate and illuminate something real about the world.

[Fist and Faith]

No, there is no solid core.

I think there's a "core," but it might not be solid. Maybe its a liquid or gas.

"My Lord Patterner, will you defy our Rule and our community, that has been one so long, upholding order against the forces of ruin? Will it be you, of all men, who break the pattern?"

"It is not glass, to break," Azver said. "It is breath, it is fire."

The truth of mathematical theorems doesn't rely upon anyone understanding them. We discover this meaning, not invent it. If we invented it, mathematics could be whatever we want. We can construct whatever sentences we want, but we can't write whatever mathematical theorems that we want. The latter are constrained by an objective, preexisting meaning that transcends our subjectivity and would be true in any possible world.

You've been at the Watch how long, and you don't know better than to say something like that about math to Av?!?