To understand a word is just to be able to make use of it. — Banno

This cannot be right. We know from many medical conditions that some people can understand words without being able to make use of them.

Broca's aphasiacs, for example, retain use of a limited vocabulary, but this does not hinder their understanding of a much broader vocabulary:



Notice how he understands the word "sixty" perfectly well, but cannot use it.

Good point. Being able to use a word is not restricted to being able to say it. So does he understand the meaning, despite not being able to use the word? He did sign six and zero;

I like that.

No, but being able to say it is a huge part of it.

Lacking the ability to say it hugely hampers your ability to use it; it does not hamper your ability to understand it. Hence, understanding and ability to use cannot be the same.

SO the argument would be that he understands the concept, but is unable to use the word.

Next step: unpack what it means for him to understand the concept. He knows how many folk are in the organisation, and can signal that with his hands; his understanding of "60" is demonstrated in the doing.

SO the argument would be that he understands the concept, but is unable to use the word. — Banno

No, he understands the word, without impediment. Yet his use of it is restricted.

Hence, your original claim, that to understand a word is to be able to use it, cannot be right.

And yet he does talk of there being 60 people in his organisation.

That's our understanding of what he said; our translation of his hand signals.

But it's a neat flip, Snakes; I will however maintain that his understanding is more than some concept in his head; that it involves his being able to signal, even without using the word, that there are sixty folk in his organisation.

If he could not signal, there would be no reason to conclude that he understood "sixty".

But then we should consider locked-in syndrome, where someone might understand but be unable to signal.

In both cases, aphasia and locked-in syndrome, we have a capacity that was previously used and then taken away.

If someone had never used "sixty", we would have no grounds to say they understood it.

But can we conclude that they do not have such understanding?

Interesting.

Latino Americans frequently understand English, but can't speak it.

I think people are probably predisposed to expect or look for meaning in the same way the mind is hard-wired to pick out human faces.

On one hand, I know that the professional mathematicians do not define sets in a way which assumes they must be finite collections. On the other hand, I was running into a wall where the insistence was that the very meaning of "collection" entails finitude. — MindForged

Try looking at it this way Mindforged. Let's assume that a collection may be infinite and then describe what it means to be a collection, keeping in mind that a collection may be infinite. I can think of many examples of what a collection cannot be under this stipulation, ( it cannot for instance, be a bunch of things collected together in a group, because this implies finitude), but I cannot imagine what being "a collection" could actually mean with this particular criterion. Can you help me, by describing what a collection would actually be, if we allow that collections may be infinite.

Oh, were you talking with @Metaphysician Undercover? no wonder there's confusion.

Let's just collect all the odd numbers and ignore him.

Can you help me, by describing what a collection would actually be, if we allow that collections may be infinite. — Metaphysician Undercover

An arbitrary quantity of elements referred to as a whole and which gain membership in said whole by means of sharing a common property we pick out or by being subject to the same stipulated rule.

E.g. the collection (set) of African Americans. Membership in that set is gained by the usual means and it wouldn't make a difference if there were ten of them, ten million of them or an infinite number of them. The above definition in no way can be said to require the number of members to be finite.

They were one of the two users, yes. :3

The shared understanding you talk about is exactly our capacity to make use of words. But of course you can't maintain that and still insist that there is a seperate, mystical thing which is the meaning of a word. — Banno

My capacity to use words is my understanding, to be sure, but my capacity to use words is not my actual use of words. I can have the mental capacity and be physiclly unable to use it, or I can simply refrain from using it, obviously. Also you don't seem to be paying attention; since I already said I believe there is no essential (in the sense of "separate", "mystical") meaning of a word.

If he could not signal, there would be no reason to conclude that he understood "sixty". — Banno

Knowing how to symbolize a concept for communication is different than knowing the concept itself. What about the fact that you can't use some foreign language that you haven't learned to communicate 60? Does that mean that you don't understand 60, or does it simply mean that you don't know the symbol in the foreign language for 60?

It would seem to me that his understanding of 60 has to do with his mathematical skills, not his skills in a particular language.

He has a predilection for essences. He is not able to think without them. Quite an odd malady, quite anachronistic.

Let's just collect all the odd numbers and ignore him. — Banno

That would be a never ending task, so you'd never have that collection. Perhaps you like to think that the impossible is possible Banno, but that's contradiction.

An arbitrary quantity of elements referred to as a whole and which gain membership in said whole by means of sharing a common property we pick out or by being subject to the same stipulated rule. — MindForged

That's fine, but if there's an infinite amount of such an element, I don't see how this qualifies as " "quantity". Don't you know that "quantity" is defined as a measurable property of something, or the number of something" Infinite is neither a measurable property nor is it a number, so you really haven't given me a definition which allows for infinity.

Really, I wish you would give more thought to what you say MindForged. How could "infinite" signify a quantity? Any such so-called "quantity" would clearly be indefinite and therefore not a quantity at all.

That would be a never ending task, — Metaphysician Undercover

I'm sure you think this, but you are wrong.

Care to prove that?

I've noticed that no one has reached the end of pi yet, why do you think that you can reach the end of the odd numbers?

Are you going to make your divine declaration "I have collected all of the odd numbers", and therefore you have collected them?

I dunno, maybe I've missed something but this move of essentializing (it's a real word, fight me) the meaning of some word doesn't seem to really move the debate along at all unless all parties involved already agree on the same meaning. — MindForged

Meanings are too slippery, too inherently viewpoint-dependent, to be concretely defined. So words are just ways to limit the scope of possible understandings to the point where they can be usefully shared.

To use words properly, you need to be willing to do two things. Accept they do intend to narrow the scope for interpretation to some habitual conceptual essence. And then also show tolerance or charity for the vagueness that must always remain. — apokrisis

I am a newcomer here, but I've already seen several threads or sub-threads bemoaning the lack of clearly-defined terms, ambiguity of meaning, and so on. There seems to be an automatic assumption that this is a Bad Thing. But perhaps we should be asking why we have vaguely-defined terms and ambiguity? Is there perhaps some value in this vagueness? I think there might be.

We all use essentially the same vocabulary, grammar and syntax for informal social interaction, White House propaganda, scientific reports, romantic fiction, poetry, prayer, philosophical discussion, and so on. Our language must support a variety of ways in which words are used. Our vocabularies are in the region of 20000-40000 words. If we had a one-word-per-clearly-defined-meaning language, I suspect we could need vocabularies of 100000 or more, maybe a lot more. And maybe that would be too much for the typical human mind to hold/manage?

There are a number of possible reasons why vagueness and ambiguity might be good things, or at least pragmatically-practical things.

• Informal social interaction makes creative use of ambiguity (word-play of all types).
• Poetry relies for its very existence on creative use of terms, sometimes stretching definitions to use a word in a new way, and thereby communicate a meaning that could not otherwise be practically expressed.
• Many words start with a literal definition, then accumulate metaphorical meanings. So ambiguity supports metaphor, to a degree.
• Maybe humans like, and therefore value, general terms, with necessarily vague definitions? Maybe it makes the things they (we!) want to say, easier to express? Everyday communication often does not need to be precise/exact, perhaps to the extent that too much precision of definition would make such use too difficult?
• As above, perhaps multiple meanings for words limits the amount of different words we need to memorise. There are practical limits to the size of vocabulary most of us can deal with.

I'm sure there are other similar points, but I can't think of any more at the moment. I think these are enough to make my point, though. :chin:

So maybe vagueness and ambiguity have benefits, and a positive purpose? It's worth considering, I think. :chin:

Behold! Here is my collection: the odd numbers.

Did I miss any? Did I include anything that shouldn't be there? No!

Astonishing, i know, but there you have it.

What sort of thing could a meaning be? — Banno

A correlation drawn between at least two things.

Words are a part of the correlation. All attribution of meaning regarding words is drawing a correlation between the words and something else.

Witt and the speech act theorists seized upon the different ways that we attribute meaning. Clearly more than just referential.

Did I include anything that shouldn't be there? No! — Banno

Neither did you include anything which should be there. I didn't see any odd numbers. Where's this collection you're referring to? It's easy to speak nonsense. Behold my collection of one hundred pounds of gold nuggets! Want to buy it?

yeah. For some reason you can’t see it. That’s not really anyone’s problem except for you.

Seems that way doesn't it?

That's fine, but if there's an infinite amount of such an element, I don't see how this qualifies as " "quantity". Don't you know that "quantity" is defined as a measurable property of something, or the number of something" Infinite is neither a measurable property nor is it a number, so you really haven't given me a definition which allows for infinity. — Metaphysician Undercover

The number of natural numbers is the infinite cardinal aleph-null. Ergo, by your definition it's a quantity. QED.

Really, I wish you would give more thought to what you say MindForged. How could "infinite" signify a quantity? Any such so-called "quantity" would clearly be indefinite and therefore not a quantity at all.

"How could it?" How could it not? It's not indefinite, the members of the "set of natural numbers" never increases or decreases, it is exactly what it is and has always been.

"How could it?" How could it not? It's not indefinite, the members of the "set of natural numbers" never increases or decreases, it is exactly what it is and has always been. — MindForged

Well, I'm not sure that's quite the case under intuitionism, where infinity is only a potential, and the only natural numbers that exist are the ones which have been stated, written down or computed.

If that's so, then under one philosophy of math, natural numbers can be added over time, in a sense that they go from potential to actual. Otherwise, one might be seen as committed to the reality of infinities and numbers we haven't constructed yet.

Hi, all! I am new here, and this is my first post. This is a very interesting thread. Nonetheless, I'm quite surprised that Foucault hasn't been mentioned here yet, especially his analysis of language in The Order of Things.

To be very short, one can say that words are arbitrary when they are not onomatopoeic. So, there is really no "essential" connection between the word and the signified. I invoke Foucault because he presents a critical picture of the history of the analysis of language across what he calls "epistemes." This is also related to the question of essence, as considered in phenomenology.

So, what does one mean by the "essence" of a word? That is a difficult question!