You’re confusing a general category (meaning in general) with its individual instances (a specific meaning). — Olivier5

I asked what the membership criteria was for the category {meaning}. You answered that it was any mental structure or event. Generic names can indeed generally be substituted for a specific member in most cases. "I'm enjoying a cup of {some type of drink}" makes just as much sense as "I'm enjoying a cup of tea", even "I'm enjoying a cup of {word with three letters beginning with T}" makes some kind of sense.

"I have {a type of meaning} in my knee" makes no sense at all, so I can't see how the class {meaings} can possibly be circumscribed by 'mental events' like pains.

A meaning is whatever thoughts are conveyed by a text. — Olivier5

Which is the tautology we started with. "All language conveys meaning" is tautological if 'meaning' is just 'that which is conveyed by language.

« Cup » and « tea » are part of the class of words. Therefore, you want a {word} of {word}? That would be the right way to substitute an instance by a set it belongs to. Words are not meaning. They are just signs, tokens for meaning.

The idea of ‘thoughts’ has been added.

Ah, what a wonderful paper. I like all these little read-along threads you do @Banno. They make me go through essays I've been meaning to read but never quite got around to. Well - I've gotten around to this and I've found it perfectly agreeable. Some immediate thoughts:

(1) It's striking to me that Davidson begins from a very similar place to Chomsky (novel grammatical or semantic constructions, to state it broadly) and ends up drawing - to Davidson's infinite credit - an almost diametrically opposite conclusion to Chomsky's waste-of-space linguistics: that language can't possibly be considered in terms of some kind of "general framework of categories and rules", and can only be taken seriously when considered in connection to "wit, luck, and wisdom from a private vocabulary and grammar, knowledge of the ways people get their point across, and rules of thumb for figuring out what deviations from the dictionary are most likely". It's nice too, to finally understand the context for that famous line about how "there is no such thing as language", which I've read a thousand times without going to the source.

(2) The paper immediately brought to mind the work of Stanley Cavell, my favourite philosopher of language (and the only post-Wittgensteinian I trust), who, in probably his most famous lines, concluded thus about language:

"We learn and teach words in certain contexts, and then we are expected, and expect others, to be able to project them into further contexts. Nothing insures that this projection will take place (in particular, not the grasping of universals nor the grasping of books of rules), just as nothing insures that we will make, and understand, the same projections. That on the whole we do is a matter of our sharing routes of interest and feeling, modes of response, senses of humor and of significance and of fulfillment, of what is outrageous, of what is similar to what else, what a rebuke, what forgiveness, of when an utterance is an assertion, when an appeal, when an explanation—all the whirl of organism Wittgenstein calls “forms of life.” Human speech and activity, sanity and community, rest upon nothing more, but nothing less, than this. It is a vision as simple as it is difficult, and as difficult as it is (and because it is) terrifying" (Cavell, "The Availability of Wittgenstein’s Later Philosophy")

The resonances with Davidson here should be obvious (notably, Cavell published this almsot 20 years before Davidson's essay!). And one of the nice things that Cavell provides - which Davidson here only opens as a question - is precisely an account of these features of language in terms of what he calls 'projection'. For Cavell, words (or phrases, in the case of malapropisms) can be "projected" into different contexts, and whether those projections take hold or not (are "acceptable", in the case of malapropisms, or "unacceptable" in those cases where we adduce that someone is just talking nonsense) depends only on our 'forms of life' - the 'whirl of organism'. Some more Cavell, for comparison:

"While it is true that we must use the same word in, project a word into, various contexts (must be willing to call some contexts the same), it is equally true that what will count as a legitimate projection is deeply controlled. You can "feed peanuts to a monkey" and "feed pennies to a meter", but you cannot feed a monkey by stuffing pennies in its mouth, and if you mash peanuts into a coin slot you won't be feeding the meter. Would you be feeding a lion if you put a bushel of carrots in his cage? That he in fact does not eat them would not be enough to show that you weren't; he may not eat his meat. But in the latter case "may not eat" means "isn't hungry then" or "refuses to eat it". And not every case of "not eating" is "refusing food".

... I might say: An object or activity or event onto or into which a concept is projected, must invite or allow that projection; in the way in which, for an object to be (called) an art object, it must allow or invite the experience and behavior which are appropriate or necessary to our concepts of the appreciation or contemplation or absorption... of an art object. What kind of object will allow or invite or be fit for that contemplation, etc., is no more accidental or arbitrary than what kind of object will be fit to serve as (what we call) a "shoe". ... You cannot use words to do what we do with them until you are initiate of the forms of life which give those words the point and shape they have in our lives." (Cavell, The Claim of Reason).

More to say, but just wanted to plonk at least these two thoughts out there for now.

Take proper names. In small, isolated groups everyone may know the names everyone else knows, and so have ready in advance of a speech encounter a theory that will, without correction, cope with the names to be employed. But even this semantic paradise will be destroyed by each new nickname, visitor, or birth. — p. 259

The semantic paradise -- what I described elsewhere as all of us speaking an idealized Tarski-model language -- is destroyed, destroyed I tell you, by having to add a name to your stock of names.

What about two people sharing the same name? When Davidson proposed his three conditions, he mentioned ambiguity:

Probably no one doubts that there are difficulties with these conditions. Ambiguity is an example: often the ‘same’ word has more than one semantic role, and so the interpretation of utterances in which it occurs is not uniquely fixed by the features of the interpreter’s competence so far mentioned. Yet, though the verbal and other features of the context of utterance often determine a correct interpretation, it is not easy or perhaps even possible to specify clear rules for disambiguation. — pp. 254-255

Wait, what? Davidson admits up front that simple ambiguity is enough to block the assignment to an utterance of a unique and correct interpretation by the interpreter without taking into account the context of the utterance, and so on, but in that same paragraph says that he hopes his argument will show that the ability, for instance, to disambiguate utterances "ought not to count as part of their basic linguistic competence" (p. 255). What kind of competence is it, if not linguistic? It's a competence that allows you to assign the unique and correct interpretation to an utterance. What kind of argument could possibly show that this is not a sort of linguistic competence?

I know, off the top of my head, at least two people named "Bob". When I'm at work and someone says to me, "Bob put in a work-order for the ceiling," I do not think I am being told my ex-father-in-law, who is retired and lives 600 miles from here, put in a work-order for the ceiling; I know that the person being referred to is the person I work with named "Bob" who does things like put in work-orders. Davidson is claiming that whatever competence allows me to do this, and while it is a competence we expect interpreters to have, it is not a specifically linguistic competence.

Why not? Because in interpreting the meaning of the utterance I have relied on many extra-linguistic facts, among which might be that the speaker doesn't know my ex-father-in-law's name, or that I have one, that he doesn't work here and couldn't possibly be putting in a work-order for us, etc. While I as a member of this speech community can figure out what my work colleague means by what they say, and this is expected of interpreters, it is not the case that my theory of English is what allowed me to do this. My semantic engine cannot, on its own, assign the proper interpretation to what they said.

I think this is what Davidson has in mind by specifically linguistic competence. My theory of the language we share does not match the theory of anyone I work with -- my theory has a "Bob" in it theirs does not. At work, we might say, I rely on a subset of my theory that leaves out the other "Bob", and my workmates similarly rely only on subsets of their theories. Is it conceivable that we all constrain our semantic engines to a point that we completely share a theory? It is conceivable, yes, but there are two issues: first, the process of constraining the interpretive engine is not itself linguistic; second, Davidson despairs of finding general rules for carrying out such a process of constraint. Note that the second point does not matter here: even if there were rules, Davidson wants to rule them out as not being linguistic rules.

Constraining your theory to a shared subset doesn't explain how an utterance of "Bob" can be taken to refer to the Bob at work, but relies on the fact that it can be: it's only because you have a semantic engine that can produce this interpretation, the correct one, as well as others, that we can talk about constraining it suitably so that it is shared. That the engine can produce this interpretation, and others, Davidson considers a linguistic competence; that you know to use only the part of the engine that produces this interpretation is something else -- related to what the engine does, clearly, but taking as given that it can do do what it does.

I think that's the argument, and there is certainly something to it. If first meaning is taken as given in a typical Gricean case analysis, for example, then by giving that analysis you aren't explaining first meaning at all but relying on it. (Again, only bringing up Grice because he does.)

I'm still not getting out of the start of the paper -- but I'm trying to clarify to myself of what's going on elsewhere. We have also this:

A better way to distinguish first meaning is through the intentions of the speaker. The intentions with which an act is performed are usually unambiguously ordered by the relation of means to ends (where this relation may or may not be causal). — p. 253

And he'll go on to list intentions and say that you can spot first meaning because it's the first in the chain of intentions to require recognition, on the part of the audience, of one of the speaker's intentions:

Of course these are not the only intentions involved; there will also be the Gricean intentions to achieve certain of these ends through Alexander’s recognition of some of the intentions involved. Diogenes’ intention to be interpreted in a certain way requires such a self-referring intention, as does his intention to ask Alexander to move. In general, the first intention in the sequence to require this feature specifies the first meaning. — pp. 253-254

Note that Davidson describes the key intention as the intention to be interpreted in a certain way, that is, for Alexander to rely on that part of his theory of Greek that he shares with Diogenes. Whatever other thoughts Diogenes may wish Alexander to entertain, if any, depend upon Alexander understanding that Diogenes is asking him to move.

For jollies, here's a sort of Gricean take: Alexander, world-conquering hero, asks Diogenes, philosopher lounging in the sun, what boon he would like; Diogenes, like some ancient Philip Marlowe, replies, "Well, for starters, you could move a little to one side -- you're blocking my light." That's a way of saying I want nothing from you qua world-conquering hero, something only you the great Alexander could give me. And yes, for Alexander to get the point that Diogenes wants nothing only he can give, he has to understand that Diogenes is saying he wants him to take a couple steps to his right.

** Far from done, but I'm off to work. **

Ah, what a wonderful paper. — StreetlightX

I thought so, too.

As well as ambiguity the paper talks, indirectly, about mis-comprehension.

In the discussion above, between @Oliver5 and @Isaac, Oliver offers a definition of meaning, and Isaac immediately presents a counter-instance that shows the definition insufficient. Or so it appears to me.

In the terms used in the article, we start with a prior theory, and search for agreement in a passing theory;

For the speaker, the prior theory is what he believes the interpreter’s prior theory to be, while his passing theory is the theory he intends the interpreter to use.

The prior theory is what is supposedly shared; the conventions. The passing theory is what is finally communicated.

Now I saw what Isaac did in presenting counter-instances. It seems that Oliver saw something not dissimilar, but insufficient for him to reappraise his contention. Instead of seeing the counter instance, he saw a misuse.

Arguably Oliver did not apply the Principle of Charity with sufficient rigour, hence misunderstanding Isaac. But if I have understood your comments on Cavell, this is only one description of the conversation among the many, one way to project the words used.

Is there then a way to decide the issue? Is Isaac misusing language, or did he demonstrate an error in Oliver's position? IF what we have is the 'whirl of organism', is there anything more here than simply my preference for Isaac's words over Oliver's?

Edit: Just wanted to make it explicit that in the discussion between Oliver and Isaac, it is clear to me that @Isaac has the better argument.

"Bob put in a work-order for the ceiling," — Srap Tasmaner

Hmmm. I'm not sure that you have entirely demolished the T-schema. We would derive:

"Bob put in a work-order for the ceiling" is true IFF Bob put in a work-order for the ceiling

Now this would be true, if we substitute Pat's ex-father-in-law for Bob:

"Pat's ex-father-in-law put in a work-order for the ceiling" is true IFF Pat's ex-father-in-law put in a work-order for the ceiling

...since both the consequent and antecedent are false, the equivalence will be true.

And it will be true for your workmate, Bob:

"Pat's workmate put in a work-order for the ceiling" is true IFF Pat's workmate put in a work-order for the ceiling

But not:

"Pat's ex-father-in-law put in a work-order for the ceiling" is true IFF Pat's workmate put in a work-order for the ceiling

unless you work with your ex-father-in-law.

This to say, perhaps T-sentences are more resilient than you first supposed.

But the T-sentence doesn't give you the interpretation; it is the interpretation; or it is one way of expressing the interpretation. The question is how do I know what to put on the RHS, isn't it?

Never mind, you're working through the truth values to determine that.

Sure. So I just deleted a two-hundred word reply.

The T-sentence in this case gives two valid interpretations; we have to use our knowledge of the context to understand which is the better. Your excellent point stands, but is already a part of Davidson's program.

Agreed. (Doing philosophy while at work is tricky.)

Yeah - you need your own office. And even then, the bloody interruptions can ruin your train of thought.

My argument is that the thing that matters to Mr. Davidson is not a thing that matters in the context of life, concrete existence, it is simply an abstract, formal consideration. Don't take my word for it: "I dip into these matters only to distinguish them from the problem raised by malapropisms and the like." — JerseyFlight

What makes you think that Davidson cares about whether his distinction matters "in the context of life. concrete existence". Does music matter in that context, does poetry or the arts generally? Any pursuit, which is not a purely practical pursuit only matters insofar as it gives pleasure, exercises and strengthens the emotions, the intellect and/or the body in some way (preferably all three).

Pursuit of disciplines that one is genuinely interested in is better than mindless passive entertainment, because insofar as they develop the emotions, intellect and the body, people's lives are improved by such pursuits, and the improvement of individuals benefits society. In fact without the improvement of individuals there is not any benefit to society; no improvement of society at all. Society has never been improved by ideologues, or any other form of dogmatist.

It seems to me it's your notion of 'only that matters which benefits society' in its narrow ideological conception that is an abstraction and is elitist and idealist to boot. You are a walking performative contradiction; imputing to others, and attacking them for, all the negatives you exemplify.

Further, philosophy can't explain this, it belongs to the domain of psychology.

Please tell us just what it is, in the context of these kinds of questions of distinction, that philosophy can't explain but that psychology can, and how?

Is Isaac misusing language — Banno

He is misusing logic, rather.

What makes you think that Davidson cares about whether his distinction matters "in the context of life. concrete existence". Does music matter in that context, does poetry or the arts generally? — Janus

I never claimed that one cannot ascend, rather, descend to an aesthetic pursuit of analytical philosophy. In that case we must stop pretending like it carries some kind higher relevance, or counts as some kind of higher social discourse. It doesn't, the real objective work is being done in other areas, analytical philosophy is an exercise in abstract games. I would even argue that this particular social form detracts from what can actually be achieved with language, it literally has a negative social value. This is not hard to prove:

Here I merely need to repeat my practical argument: 'You will still be using language just like we are still using mathematics after Gödel. And what matters most of all, is not papers like Davidson's, but those who figure how to use words to make the world a better place. Should we get a million people to read this paper by Davidson, or should we get a million people to read, "The Boy Who Was Raised as a Dog," by Perry and Szalavitz? There is no contest. What these authors are doing in terms of relevance blows Davidson out of the water. And remember, life is short, so this is a decision we must make over and over again, and this is what I know: analytical philosophy loses.'

Language is psychological as well as developmental, you will not explain it by multiplying analytical philosophy's abstractions. If you miss vital stages of development you will be cognitively impaired, most especially in your language capacity. This is not an abstract consideration... analytical philosophy doesn't tell us anything here! What people are doing on this thread cannot even be justified in terms of real-world-relevance. As your response betrays, it's just an aesthetic game that analyzes abstract ideals. One is entitled to it, but one is not entitle to call it responsible philosophy.

"Another reason this [Analytical Philosophy] is fruitless is that the analyses we devise would not be particularly useful, even if one of them were widely accepted. The analyses that epistemologists now debate are so complicated and confusing that you would never try to actually explain the concept of knowledge to anyone by using them. So what is the point?..." Michael Huemer

So what is the point?..." — JerseyFlight

The "point" is merely to sharpen one's mind in this particular game, just to explore the possibilities of a certain kind of analysis. If you enjoy it, then there's a point to it; if not then not.

Who are you to simply pronounce that this pursuit "has a negative social value"? If it is "not hard to prove", then why have you not done so? In what way do you think it has a negative social value, and what's your argument for thinking so?

Instead of derailing this thread, why not start another entitled "Analytic Philosophy Has a Negative Social Value", and make your case there?

Who are you to simply pronounce that this pursuit "has a negative social value"? — Janus

I did not merely pronounce it, I provided a practical argument. Further the quote by Huemer, who has written 60 plus books (I don't like this game but will do it anyway only because of how analytical philosophers think, which is in terms of elitism) -- how many books have you written?

In what way do you think it has a negative social value, and what's your argument for thinking so? — Janus

Quite simple: people are communicating all over the place. Not all communication is the same, neither is it equivalent in terms of social value. Just take a look at this thread for instance, there are vast problems in the world and here we have a bunch of people talking about the abstract ideals of language, as refugees shuffle from island to island, as America collapses into authoritarianism, as the globe continues warming, as children lack essential nutrients and come from broken homes that shatter their cognitive quality and potential, and you stand here, bold faced, defending the doctrinaire, academic eccentricities of one Donald Davidson?

Let me tell you what the men who wrote the book I referenced have done with their communication. They have probed deeply into the damage that trauma inflicts on young lives, and they have sough to find a way to heal these poor, young, abused members of our species. There is no contest. The very fact that analytical philosophy has conditioned you to come at me the way you are is only further proof of its elitism, irrelevance and special pleading for its prolix form and idealist cause. Tell me, what are you really doing with your time when you spend it probing this kind of stuff? There is a vast world of productive and relevant communication beyond it! Communication that actually achieves real world value. And if you are not giving your time to this, then you are blinded, you are playing at mere abstraction, as Peter Unger said, a bunch of "empty ideas" that lead nowhere.

I've started a new thread and copied this debate there, so as to refrain from derailing the thread further.

Is there then a way to decide the issue? Is Isaac misusing language, or did he demonstrate an error in Oliver's position? IF what we have is the 'whirl of organism', is there anything more here than simply my preference for Isaac's words over Oliver's? — Banno

One of the reasons I chose the Cavell quote I did (the second one) was because it tries to make quite explicit that 'preference' is not at all what is at stake. To cite again: "What kind of object will allow or invite or be fit for that contemplation, etc., is no more accidental or arbitrary than what kind of object will be fit to serve as (what we call) a "shoe"... You cannot use words to do what we do with them until you are initiate of the forms of life which give those words the point and shape they have in our lives" (my bolding). One way to read this is that what staves off arbitariness here are necessities imposed upon use by our engagements with and of the world: the flip-side of this is what I take to be Davidson's point: what 'controls' the acceptability or not of malapropism (instead of just nonsense) cannot be adduced from some self-contained thing called 'language'. Which, to put it in fun terms that I like, is to say simply that all language is extra-linguistic.

Cavell even employs - in the next section - a nice Wittgensteinian distinction between saying and showing, which I believe you're quite fond of:

When I give you directions, I can adduce only exterior facts about directions, e.g., I can say, "Not that road, the other, the one passing the clapboard houses; and be sure to bear left at the railroad crossing". But I cannot say what directions are in order to get you to go the way I am pointing, nor say what my direction is, if that means saying something which is not a further specification of my direction, but as it were, cuts below the actual pointing to something which makes my pointing finger point. When I cite or teach you a rule, I can adduce only exterior facts about rules, e.g., say that it applies only when such-and-such is the case, or that it is inoperative when another rule applies, etc. But I cannot say what following rules is uberhaupt, nor say how to obey a rule in a way which doesn't presuppose that you already know what it is to follow them.

This 'what cannot be said' is precisely the 'non-linguistic' element inherent in all use of language, and as such, co-constitutive of it. Hence Davidson's conclusion: "we should realize that we have abandoned not only the ordinary notion of a language, but we have erased the boundary between knowing a language and knowing our way around in the world generally".

Oh, alright, Damn you. I just loaded Must we mean what we say? on Kindle. Which paper should I read first?

The first 3 essays in that collection are indispensable. I want to start a thread on the first essay at some point. Especially on the bit about rules and games. Also, the last quote I cited- about saying and showing - is from The Claim of Reason, I should mention. The essay on Endgame is a hilarious takedown of a great deal of analytic philosophy which I love too. The later essays are a bit... meandering.

I want to start a thread on the first essay at some point. — StreetlightX

Good plan.

« Cup » and « tea » are part of the class of words. Therefore, you want a {word} of {word}? That would be the right way to substitute an instance by a set it belongs to. Words are not meaning. They are just signs, tokens for meaning. — Olivier5

Only when quoted. A cup is a type of drinking vessel and Tea is a drink made from dried leaves. 'Cup' is a word and 'tea' is a word. They were not thus quoted in the sentence I used, the grammar tells us whether I'm referring to the word 'cup' or the thing - a cup. So if I was to substitute the genus {words} for each specific case 'cup' and 'tea', it would make perfect sense in sentence referring to those cases as words (ie quoted or otherwise signified), rather than as objects.

It remains the case that for specific cases which are members of a class we can substitute the genera for the specifics and retain the comprehensibility of the sentence.

"'Tea' is an English word derived from the Mandarin" = "Some specific {word} is an English word derived from the Mandarin"

"I would like a cup of tea" = "I would like some specific {drink}"

"I have a pain in my knee" <> "I have some specific {meaning} in my knee"

As such pain cannot be a type of meaning.

The idea of ‘thoughts’ has been added. — Olivier5

So... "A meaning is whatever thoughts are conveyed by a text.".

You want to claim (contra Davidson, Wittgenstein etc..) that "Language conveys meaning". That when we talk, the purpose (and so the preserved value in translation) is some property of the utterance - it's 'meaning' - which is conveyed from one speaker to another.

I asked you what kind of category a 'meaning' was -what types of thing belong to it. 'Mental structures and events' doesn't seem right because we cannot substitute specific cases of such things for there general class and still be understood.

Now you're suggesting it is the thought which is conveyed, that 'meaning' is a type of thought (those which are conveyed by text). I'm not sure I can quite see that either, without some mental gymnastics. If yell "Get out of the way!", it's not my thought I'm trying to convey (someone is in the way, I'd better get them to move) - that would be useless, it would just lead to the target of my utterance also thinking that someone was in the way and they'd better move them. We could say that the general thought of being in the way is what I'm trying to communicate, but I'm not. I'm not even trying to communicate any thought at all. I want him to get out of the way, even if that's by shock alone, I don't care if he has an appropriate thought associated with it or merely a Pavlovian response.

To riff a bit more on thoughts inspired by the paper: I think the distinction between 'passing theory' and 'prior theory' is really interesting, and they are even more so when thought together with some other super interesting issues regarding langauge. Two, related issues, in particular: that of the status of examples, as well as the issue of learning. In both cases of language-use (which are usually brought up in tandem, i.e. we use examples in order to teach) what's at stake is a kind of spontaneous generation of a "passing theory". A passing theory, moreover, that can be generalized to become a 'prior theory' (i.e. when you're teaching someone, you say 'you do it like *this*', and the student is expected to figure out how to do the same for other cases of *this* - c.f. Witty's comments on 'learning how to go on', PI§151).

In some sense, the 'prior theory' is misnamed: 'prior' theories are not 'prior'; they are, instead, after the fact. They are ratiocinations of what are instead generated in situ and then projected backward in time: effects mistaken for causes. So-called 'prior' theories function, at best then, as sets of heuristics, resources to look to in some cases of trying to figure out novelty, but not at all as distributing the grammatical shape of words or phrases.

Anyway, examples are so interesting because they effect a kind of convergence between 'passing' and 'prior' theories: they enact a passing theory whose status is to be taken for a 'prior' theory ("this is how things ought to be done"). Or to put it otherwise, they effect a kind of short-circuit between saying and showing: examples show how one is to do something as much as what one is to do. Examples show what they say. (to quote Girogio Agamben: "Neither particular nor universal, the example is a singular object that presents itself as such, that shows its singularity. Hence the pregnancy of the Greek term, for example: para-deigma, that which is shown alongside". (The Coming Community)).

And this in turn sheds light on the notion of 'use', and helps to show why 'use' does not in any way mean 'use among a community'. There's a great remark in Davidson: "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... 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’" - a single instance is all that is needed generate a use: it might even be a 'one-off. Malapropisms function very similarly: they are 'one-offs' that generate their own passing theory that can be recognized as such. And I can't think of any off the top of my head, but I'm pretty sure that there are malapropisms that have become, through common use, accepted as terms of their own.

"I have a pain in my knee" <> "I have some specific {meaning} in my knee" — Isaac

You are replacing a word by the class of meanings. Of course it's different. That's like replacing an apple by the class of oranges... Duh.

Words are tokens that code for meaning, but they are not meaning themselves. That's the classic distinction between 'signifier' aka 'sign' (word) and 'signified' (meaning or concept). The word is different from the concept meant by the word.

You want to claim (contra Davidson, Wittgenstein etc..) that "Language conveys meaning". That when we talk, the purpose (and so the preserved value in translation) is some property of the utterance - it's 'meaning' - which is conveyed from one speaker to another. — Isaac

Exactly. Let me know if you actually disagree with that claim.

That's like replacing an apple by the class of oranges... — Olivier5

No, that's like replacing 'apple' by 'fruit'...

You guys are very confused. Not sure I can do anything more at this point... Maybe the idea that words have meaning will sink in after some time. You never know...

“Nothing can be imagined which is too strange or incredible to have been said by some philosopher.”
-- Descartes

“There is nothing so absurd which some philosophers have not maintained.”
-- Thomas Reid

“There is… no banality so banal that no philosopher will deny it.”
-- Louise Antony

Source: The Consciousness Deniers, by Galen Strawson
https://www.nybooks.com/daily/2018/03/13/the-consciousness-deniers/
(an excellent text, somewhat related)

You are replacing a word by the class of meanings. — Olivier5

As I wrote previously, if I was referring to the word 'pain' I would have quoted it or otherwise indicated by context. I wasn't replacing the word 'pain' qua word, I was replacing pain, the object of the sentence. Thus, as @Banno just said...

What you did, technically and factually, is take out the word 'pain', and replace it by another, the word (or symbol) '{meaning}'. That's what you did, period. And I don't actually understand why you did that.