There's a spectrum between creativity and orthodoxy. Go too far in either direction and you have bullshit.

In the spirit of the original thread, though, I'd ask what is the meaning of identification statements?

Is there a Public Shelf Meaning to:

"I walked home"?

I suspect that's not an identification statement in the sense of identifying-with, except for how we might interpret "I"

"Richard Nixon was a good Democrat"

doesn't sound like an identification statement to me. It sounds like a statement written to make people angry.

But it is of the form of an identification statement, complete with the "way" modifier "good".

I don't want to focus on him — Moliere

Oh, go ahead and focus on me. I'm 76 and haven't had my 15 minutes of fame yet -- just -7 minutes and 23 seconds worth.

Is there a Public Shelf Meaning to:

"I walked home"? — Moliere

Yes; "home" has numerous Public Shelf meanings and usages.

a) baseball (home base)
b) the 'home' keys on the QWERTY keyboard--'f' and 'j'
c) magic (rub your ruby crocs together 3 times and say "get me the hell out of here and back home."
d) a place to die ("Home is where, when you go there, they have to take you in." The Death of the Hired Man by Robert Frost
e) retail (Home Depot; the Home Store; HOM;
f) medical (a facility you may be sent to possibly against your will) old folks home; nursing home; a home for the very bewildered
g) a trait of animals -- homing instinct

Words have recognized usage. Where can you find a record of current and past word usage? In the 20 fat volumes of the Oxford English Dictionary.

Words have denotations (their plain most direct meaning) and connotations (their nuanced, shaded meaning). "The armored car weighs a ton" is denotative. "She weighs a ton" is connotative.

Take away: The Public Shelf meaning of words has plenty of room to maneuver. It isn't necessary or desirable for each individual to supply his or her own meaning nor for each use of a word to have a unique meaning.

You could be like Humpty Dumpty: 'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.'

Fine for the cracked egg.

Meaning evolves as it accrues new experience. Barring simple ostensives, the meaning of words derives from their function in sentence-level constructs (or larger). Average vocabulary ranges typically from about 10 to 30,000 words. What any given (non-trivial) word - duty for example - means for a person with a vocabulary of 10,000 words must be different from what it means for a person with a vocabulary of 30,000 words. Except if the former is in the military, and the latter is a cloistered academic. So meaning must be complex function of both social activity and linguistic competence.

Bullshit:(Creative---Orthodoxy):Bullshit

Is Bullshit on the left-hand side the same as Bullshit on the right hand side?

And do you mean Bullshit like Harry Frankfurt?

:D I'll only take a minute of your remaining fame.

Yes; "home" has numerous Public Shelf meanings and usages.

a) baseball (home base)
b) the 'home' keys on the QWERTY keyboard--'f' and 'j'
c) magic (rub your ruby crocs together 3 times and say "get me the hell out of here and back home."
d) a place to die ("Home is where, when you go there, they have to take you in." The Death of the Hired Man by Robert Frost
e) retail (Home Depot; the Home Store; HOM;
f) medical (a facility you may be sent to possibly against your will) old folks home; nursing home; a home for the very bewildered
g) a trait of animals -- homing instinct

Words have recognized usage. Where can you find a record of current and past word usage? In the 20 fat volumes of the Oxford English Dictionary.

Words have denotations (their plain most direct meaning) and connotations (their nuanced, shaded meaning). "The armored car weighs a ton" is denotative. "She weighs a ton" is connotative.

Take away: The Public Shelf meaning of words has plenty of room to maneuver. It isn't necessary or desirable for each individual to supply his or her own meaning nor for each use of a word to have a unique meaning.

You could be like Humpty Dumpty: 'When I use a word,' Humpty Dumpty said in rather a scornful tone, 'it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.'

Fine for the cracked egg. — BC

We both agree that words have a recognized usage. Meaning is public. I think the part of the metaphor I dislike is the "shelf" part, as if it's in a garage somewhere or containable in a Museum: language-as-bicycle. I certainly don't subscribe to the Humpty Dumpty theory of meaning, though.

But let's take a gander to a time before the Oxford English Dictionary was invented. The "shelf" part of the metaphor looses potency, though we might have to gander further back before the printing press to take the wind out of its sails. And before ships how were journeys and transitions talked of? What of the record of the metaphors before the script, when all writing was phonic?

My uncertainty is more to do with how meaning becomes public than whether it is. Or, since private meaning is a nonsense a how question for publicity is likewise nonsense, how is meaning shared?

Meaning evolves as it accrues new experience. Barring simple ostensives, the meaning of words derives from their function in sentence-level constructs (or larger). Average vocabulary ranges typically from about 10 to 30,000 words. What any given (non-trivial) word - duty for example - means for a person with a vocabulary of 10,000 words must be different from what it means for a person with a vocabulary of 30,000 words. Except if the former is in the military, and the latter is a cloistered academic. So meaning must be complex function of both social activity and linguistic competence. — Pantagruel

Your opening sentence is a bit cryptic. Is it the meaning which accrues new experience, or is it the speaker?

Your opening sentence is a bit cryptic. Is it the meaning which accrues new experience, or is it the speaker? — Moliere

Yes, that was the idea. We are the avenues by which meaning accrues, but, in some real sense, it must also be external to us since it is objectively encapsulated and shared. It is a bit of an enigma. Possibly the notion of a collective entity solves this?

the meaning of words derives from their function in sentence-level constructs (or larger). — Pantagruel

So meaning is emergent in language rather than resident in word atoms. To take the exemplary example, the meaning of the word 'meaning' was analysed and emerged, or as I would maintain, actually drowned forever, in the seminal book The Meaning of Meaning, by Ogden & Richards. (I hereby condemn @Moliere to skim reading the entire wretched book as punishment for starting the topic. The word should no longer be spoken in polite society.)

Meaning,n. That which is consumed as fuel by philosophy, and produced by poetry.

:up:
Why wretched? I thought it a good read.

My uncertainty is more to do with how meaning becomes public than whether it is. Or, since private meaning is a nonsense a how question for publicity is likewise nonsense, how is meaning shared? — Moliere

One of my pet peeves is the way the Private Language Argument is misinterpreted on this site. Some people do it over and over and that misinterpretation spreads. The argument only suggests that you can't have a language that is untranslatable even in principle. This has no bearing whatsoever on whether you can make up your own words for things, or have your own private thoughts which you never share with others.

So yes, you can make up words that you never tell others about. The reason you have no trouble keeping your private language straight is that it's resting on a shared language, which has rules that you learn from others.

Language use can be broken down into these parts:

Utterances: these are the actual sounds you make, or the marks you create when you write.
Sentences: these are formal entities, like The cat is on the mat. Imagine you have a group of friends who have decided to use "The cat is on the mat" as a code for You have spinach in your teeth.

You can see that the meaning of the sentence depends on the context of utterance. This is always true.

Propositions: In the case of your group of friends who have used a sentence as a code, the proposition expressed by "The cat is on the mat" is that you have spinach in your teeth. So propositions are the meanings of uttered sentences. If you take the sentence out of context and just focus on it as a formal entity, though it may have a logical meaning, it doesn't have any specific meaning.

This is the importance of saying that meaning is use. Look to use to discern meaning. Look at the setting of the utterance of "It's a small number" to discern what proposition is being expressed. Meaning is use does not mean that meaning is the actual utterances. That's absurd, but there are people on this forum who will blow through that absurdity and assert it anyway.

I hereby condemn Moliere to skim reading the entire wretched book as punishment for starting the topic. — unenlightened

Why wretched? I thought it a good read. — Pantagruel

I haven't read the book; perhaps the authors share valuable ideas. The authors practice a wretched style of composition I associate with 19th century academic writing: complex sentences containing way too many clauses and phrases.

Convinced as they are of the urgency of a stricter examination of language from a point of view which is at present receiving no attention, the authors have preferred to publish this essay in its present form rather than to wait, perhaps indefinitely, until, in lives otherwise sufficiently occupied, enough moments of leisure had accumulated for it to be rewritten in a more complete and more systematized form. — Ogden & Richards

Ogden was the creator of "basic English", a means of communication requiring less than 1,000 unique words. Basic English has some merits, but it would definitely rule out the kind of snarled sentence quoted above.

"The cat is on the mat" is that you have spinach in your teeth. — frank

The sentence "The cat is on the mat" takes me back to 1968 and a very basic literacy workbook the Job Corps was using. There was a line drawing depicting "the cat is on the mat". Very basic literacy instruction.

I have never worried about spinach in my teeth, but I have come across several literary uses of worrisome spinach lodged in the narrator's teeth. Who eats so much spinach, I'd like to know.

I'll only take a minute of your remaining fame. — Moliere

But you are not "taking a minute of fame" you are contributing a minute (or seconds, really) of fame. For which I am grateful. Every second counts.

snarled sentence — BC

It's a lovely sentence.

My penalty is too heavy to bare! :D I probably have earned the sentence, though, given how often I wonder about meaning.

I like the relationship between poet and philosopher -- subversive to put the poet as the maker of what the philosopher needs to do his craft!

Yes, that was the idea. We are the avenues by which meaning accrues, but, in some real sense, it must also be external to us since it is objectively encapsulated and shared. It is a bit of an enigma. Possibly the notion of a collective entity solves this? — Pantagruel

Unless I'm misunderstanding what you mean by "collective entity", I think that's the idea behind Propositions. But I thought your original proposal more interesting because it makes meaning dependent on even more than context, but also one's knowledge of a particular language. So this multiplies meanings even more while sensibly saying how it is they are multiplied -- since meanings are changed by what they are couched in, not just the meanings that are around the sentence but even the knowledge of a speaker is relevant.

Which would really put a number on determining identity-statements -- the very same phrase in the same context spoken by two different speakers, even in the third person, can mean different things. "He is a cautious man" so rest assured vs "He is a cautious man" so don't expect him to do much.

That's absurd, but there are people on this forum who will blow through that absurdity and assert it anyway. — frank

I thought that at one point, though sometimes I flirt with the notion too. But it is absurd, I understand. (though the world is too by my reckoning, so there are worse conclusions)

One of my pet peeves is the way the Private Language Argument is misinterpreted on this site. Some people do it over and over and that misinterpretation spreads. The argument only suggests that you can't have a language that is untranslatable even in principle. This has no bearing whatsoever on whether you can make up your own words for things, or have your own private thoughts which you never share with others. — frank

I think I'm tracking. This is why I thought going down the PLA was different from understanding Identity -- but I do think the PLA has a bearing on some common thoughts about the meaning of identity-statements. Of course we have private thoughts we can keep to ourselves, but this doesn't speak against the argument basically. In defense of this interpretation it's common for people to go the other way with it, too, and claim that Wittgenstein is wrong because we obviously have a private life, or some such.

When the truth is that Wittgenstein was such a philosopher's philosopher that it's best to reserve judgments from thinking he supports this or that thing we care about. (early on cutting my teeth on W. I did the same thing -- seeing connections to leftist politics and all that. Eventually I figured out that that part was all me just trying to grasp the thoughts of a genius mind. It's an easy mistake to make with the greats)

But I thought your original proposal more interesting because it makes meaning dependent on even more than context, but also one's knowledge of a particular language. So this multiplies meanings even more while sensibly saying how it is they are multiplied -- since meanings are changed by what they are couched in, not just the meanings that are around the sentence but even the knowledge of a speaker is relevant. — Moliere

Yes, there really are no "generic usages," (unless perhaps media is contributing to the creation of a "generic mind"). But maybe not all nuance is important.

I thought that at one point, though sometimes I flirt with the notion too. But it is absurd, I understand. (though the world is too by my reckoning, so there are worse conclusions) — Moliere

:grin:

When the truth is that Wittgenstein was such a philosopher's philosopher that it's best to reserve judgments from thinking he supports this or that thing we care about. (early on cutting my teeth on W. I did the same thing -- seeing connections to leftist politics and all that. Eventually I figured out that that part was all me just trying to grasp the thoughts of a genius mind. It's an easy mistake to make with the greats) — Moliere

Some commentary I read said that a high percentage of interpretations are based on reading in ideas not expressed by W. Maybe that stuff ends up being more interesting than W. himself.

but I do think the PLA has a bearing on some common thoughts about the meaning of identity-statements — Moliere

Like "Jack is a dog"? That kind of statement?

The applicable sentence in Latin is "De gustibus non est disputandum".

Is the right question "why do we say the same things?" or "why do we say new things?" ?

What's up with this question of meaning, linguistically? — Moliere

I will try to answer that first, uninfluenced by other responses, then read the rest of the thread.

The purpose of language is communication. In the early development of human language, this communication was minimal as to vocabulary and grammatical structure, but vital, as to its function. "Run" may have been the first word ever spoken. The listener who not understand its meaning was eaten by a saber-toothed tiger and left fewer progeny than the ones who did understand it. In order to optimize clan survival, language was standardized within the group, so that all members would respond appropriately to warnings, reprimands, hunting deployment instructions and food allocation.

Thereafter, language grew, expanded to functions beyond the immediate and pragmatic survival communications: to express feelings, tell stories, deliver messages between separated individuals, conduct transactions, convey more complex information regarding weather, geography, etc. Eventually, it branched out in specialized sophisticated human endeavours, such as commerce, warfare, science, religion, social interactions and art.

Only in the last two applications is there leeway for imprecision and creative usage. Those two applications adapt over time through innovative uses of language which become popular, and also through influence from other cultures. The scientific, military and economic applications expand and change as new knowledge is gained, as technology is invented, as transactions multiply: new things, processes and relations must be named.

All of these evolutionary changes are possible without disrupting communication, only as long as they take place logically (there is a need for a new word, a comprehensible reason for an adjustment, and consensus among the primary users of the jargon) and gradually (so that the users of the language have time to learn the new application.) Otherwise, Babel ensues.

Like "Jack is a dog"? That kind of statement? — frank

Yup, that fits the form. The original question was with respect to gender-identity, but the form is there.

The one thing about the form that might elude the original disagreement is that "Jack is a dog" can be read not just as an identity-statement, but also as a description. It'd depend upon the context -- if the question is "Did you buy a cat or a dog?" then that's a description, but if Jack is running around the yard barking like dogs do, and so you express "Jack is a dog" then that's an identity-statement.

Excellent summary there.

Why wretched? I thought it a good read. — Pantagruel

I'm not entirely serious, but having read it more than once, I don't feel much further forward. It tells how the word is used, but that's like telling me that a frying pan is used by heating it from below. Good useful stuff no doubt, but what's for dinner?

Yup, that fits the form. The original question was with respect to gender-identity, but the form is there.

The one thing about the form that might elude the original disagreement is that "Jack is a dog" can be read not just as an identity-statement, but also as a description. It'd depend upon the context -- if the question is "Did you buy a cat or a dog?" then that's a description, but if Jack is running around the yard barking like dogs do, and so you express "Jack is a dog" then that's an identity-statement. — Moliere

I'm sorry, I'm out of the loop on what the original disagreement was. If the question is asked: "Is that a dog?", the meaning of the uttered sentence is partly a matter of context and partly about what we pick out as dogs by convention.

Excellent summary there. — unenlightened

Thanks!

The applicable sentence in Latin is "De gustabus non est disputandem".

I'm sorry, I'm out of the loop on what the original disagreement was. If the question is asked: "Is that a dog?", the meaning of the uttered sentence is partly a matter of context and partly about what we pick out as dogs by convention. — frank

Probably best to leave the context behind. That was the idea behind starting a new thread -- I didn't want the conversation on identity in the masculinity thread to become a conversation on the meaning of statements of identity. But the creation of this thread was a bit extemporaneous from my usual approach: trying to spin off into another discussion that is more suitable to the question of meaning.

"By convention" is doing a lot of work in that sentence, with that in mind. Isn't that like pointing to the public shelf of meaning?

"By convention" is doing a lot of work in that sentence, with that in mind. Isn't that like pointing to the public shelf of meaning? — Moliere

Yes. It is. Is that bad?

It's the metaphor I reject from the outset, at least. Though it seems we're in agreement on the limitations of the PLA, too. So I think it just makes me confused.

OK I see that context wasn't in this thread -- guess I should have waited a bit in thinking out the OP after all. Oh well.