That is why I talk about sign systems. — JuanZu

But it is this exact these "sign" systems I'm taking about. Initially I thought you meant "symbols", but as you went on, I saw hat you wer really talking about signs. And, although I am a linguistic person, I can't see how they can play such a basic and important role in language and communication as ypu postulate in this thread with me.

Thus, taking the example of a book (a book-dictionary), the written marks enter into a relationship with our language sedimented in our memory. — JuanZu

Language is not something simply settled in memory like words and other symbols. It is much more than that. It is a system of communication, which in turn is a process of exchanging information, and as such it is live, even if written on paper, displayed on a monitor, etc. in the form of words and other symbols. Because this text when read becomes "live" in our mind and creates thoughts, i.e. the reverse process occurs of how the text is [created in the first place. The whole process is a kind of encoding and decoding.

E.g. the message that you are reading right now has been processed from information (thought with meaning (in my mind) into language (on paper), in the form of words or abbreviations, punctiation marks and other symbols (e.g. emojis, if it is transmitted in electronic form). This is the "encoding". When this reaches a recipient, the process is reversed.

(The sign language you are talking about is a special form of language that uses visual-manual modality to convey meaning, instead of spoken words (and other symbols contained in written language.)

Wittgenstein's theory would ignore the book as an active agent and give primacy to the subject as the producer of meaning as he uses his learned language. — JuanZu

I wonder what mess would have been created if he was taking that alo into consideration! :grin:

there is a reason why there are no emoji-type expressions, casual expressions and so on. The reason is that there is the intention of objectivity, of the concept and of the universal. — JuanZu

Exactly.

I also wanted to point out that according to the theory of the sign that I work on (which refers to the texts of Peirce, Derrida, Saussure among others) it is always, in a certain sense, universalizing — JuanZu

That's much better. At least now I know what you mean by sign systems and I can trurn to these guys and the theory of (the) sign or theory of signs (I just saw that there are some variation of the term.)
Thanks. (Even if you did that unintentionally. :smile:)

Have a great new year!

I don't really disagree with you on the importance of words and definitions in philosophy but if you want to make progress in philosophy you need to go beyond common usage. Common usage might have the effect of ingraining false beliefs into our thinking that we don't realize.

Also strict definitions might have a straight jacket effect of not going outside the lines when we should be crossing some false mental thresholds.

For example information and consciousness are two separate things by their common definitions but in their physical state are one in the same. A prime example of words gone wrong.

Consciousness is physically a brain state.
Information is physically a brain state.

If you want to argue that information is not a brain state I would advise against it. The definitions that say otherwise are fantasies of the mind.

you need to go beyond common usage. Common usage might have the effect of ingraining false beliefs into our thinking that we don't realize. — Mark Nyquist

I never said to stick to common dictionaries as far as philosophy is concerned. Although, good disctionaties include specialized definitions of terms when terms have special meaning and usage in philosophy. (They use for that indications such as "In philosophy:", (philos.), etc.) Those who are using dictionaries on a regular basis know that well.
But if one wants to explore a term/concept exclusively in a philosophical context, there are a lot of specialized dictionaries and encyclopedias of philosophy that one can refer to. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy suggests some of them (https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/analysis/s1.html):

• Cambridge Dictionary of Philosophy, 1999, ed. Robert Audi
• Concise Oxford Dictionary, 1976, ed. J. B. Sykes
• Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology, 1925, ed. James Mark Baldwin
• A Kant Dictionary, 1995, by Howard Caygill
• Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy, 1996, by Simon Blackburn
• Philosophielexikon, 1997, ed. A. Hügli and P. Lübcke
• Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 1998, entry under ‘Analytical Philosophy’ by Thomas Baldwin
• Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 1998, entry under ‘Conceptual Analysis’ by Robert Hanna

And Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy itself, of course.

Have a great new year! — Alkis Piskas

Ευχαριστω. Same to you.

I agree with everything. I would just like to clarify that a system of signs is not necessarily a living system of signs [this would be demonstrated by computation]. As for "exchanging information" I have always wondered what is being exchanged. That is, continuing with the example of this forum, you see these marks on a screen, they are pixels. Where is the information and meaning of these marks? I can use a magnifying glass or a microscope to examine these pixels and probably won't find anything like meaning. It is because of this problem that I speak of meaning as an effect of an effective and active relationship between signs. It follows that nothing is exchanged, but is constantly produced as something new. Right now, when you read this, you are creating meaning as an effect of "my" words. But I am certainly not sending you anything, I am simply provoking something in you in a technologically mediated relationship. This is very counterintuitive.

(The sign language you are talking about is a special form of language that uses visual-manual modality to convey meaning, instead of spoken words (and other symbols contained in written language.) — Alkis Piskas

I agree. There are sign systems of all kinds. When I talk about sign systems I do so in a more or less formal sense. There are written, spoken, thought, machined and many more types of systems in nature.

I wonder what mess would have been created if he was taking that alo into consideration! :grin: — Alkis Piskas

Given Wittgenstein's character, I prefer not to think about what he would answer. It makes me anxious.



Have a great new year too.

So, a Wittgensteinian, eh? — Alkis Piskas

Philosophy is not like football. Although some folk treat it that way. it's not about teams.

I claim that signification always has a dead but totally active face. — JuanZu

I've been unable to follow this.

I would just like to clarify that a system of signs is not necessarily a living system of signs [this would be demonstrated by computation]. — JuanZu

I have not explored the "theory of signs" yet in order to assimilate this ...

As for "exchanging information" I have always wondered what is being exchanged. That is, continuing with the example of this forum, you see these marks on a screen, they are pixels. Where is the information and meaning of these marks? I can use a magnifying glass or a microscope to examine these pixels and probably won't find anything like meaning. It is because of this problem that I speak of meaning as an effect of an effective and active relationship between signs — JuanZu

Exactly. There's no information anywhere, until someone decodes (translates, interprets) the words or symbols (or signs, in your case) and gets the meaning they convey. Because even just decoding is not enough. These symbols --either by themselves( isolated) or in combination (as a group, structure)-- have to create a meaning in the mind in order that they can be considered information (knowledge).

Now, one could disagree and say, e.g. "But this book contains information." Yes, but only loosely speaking, not literally. If you open this book, and look at it, touch it or smell it, you won't find any information. Not until you start reading it and and what you read has a meaning for you. Because the book make contain nonsense, symbols that are unknown to you, which may well be just "garbage", or belong to some code, e.g. Morse Code, which has to be decoded, etc. One can say that the book contains information (knowledge) only if one reads it and gets a meaning from what one reads.

I can use a magnifying glass or a microscope to examine these pixels and probably won't find anything like meaning. It is because of this problem that I speak of meaning as an effect of an effective and active relationship between signs. — JuanZu

Exactly.

It follows that nothing is exchanged, but is constantly produced as something new. Right now, when you read this, you are creating meaning as an effect of "my" words. But I am certainly not sending you anything, I am simply provoking something in you in a technologically mediated relationship. This is very counterintuitive. — JuanZu

I think you are speaking about different moments in time, two different events. My reading of your message happens in a different period of time and location. Once you have sent the message, your part (encoding) is completed. When I receive your message and start reading it, a decoding process takes place.
However, there will still be no exchange (communication) between us, until I reply you back with a message of mine, in whatever form and content, whenever this happens and from whatever place.

Now, again, one could disagree and say, e.g. "But JuanZu has communated something to you, independently of whether you receive it, read it, reply to it, etc.". And again, yes, but only loosely speaking. No communication (exchange) can take place until the other part replies to the message, in whatever form, time and place. Even with just an "OK" or a symbol, like an emoji. And even without actually reading and obtaining the conveyed information. Well, this would not be of course the best one could expect from a communication, but it would still be a communication. There would be an exchange of information.

When I talk about sign systems I do so in a more or less formal sense. There are written, spoken, thought, machined and many more types of systems in nature. — JuanZu

Yes, I can undestand all this now.

Given Wittgenstein's character, I prefer not to think about what he would answer. It makes me anxious. — JuanZu

:grin:

Philosophy is not like football. Although some folk treat it that way. it's not about teams. — Banno

Agree.

Again I agree with everything, except for one thing:

Now, again, one could disagree and say, e.g. "But JuanZu has communated something to you, independently of whether you receive it, read it, reply to it, etc.". And again, yes, but only loosely speaking. No communication (exchange) can take place until the other part replies to the message, in whatever form, time and place. Even with just an "OK" or a symbol, like an emoji. And even without actually reading and obtaining the conveyed information. Well, this would not be of course the best one could expect from a communication, but it would still be a communication. There would be an exchange of information. — Alkis Piskas

I have problems with this. When we talk about exchange we talk about something that passes from one side to the other while being the same. Like money, or a commodity. However, that does not happen with meaning and information. If I talk to you, no matter how much you respond to me, your words (like sounds, sound waves) do not contain any meaning that travels through the air with them. In each moment the meaning is created as something new (that is why there can always be error in interpretation, a "wrong" meaning because it is always new).

If you ask me something and I answer you, my answer in terms of exchange is as "empty" as your question. You may reply to me "but then there is no communication." And there certainly isn't if we continue to think of communication as representation. That is to say, normally when I hear your words – whether in the form of a question or in the form of an answer – I imagine that I am thinking the same thing as you but duplicated. However, that is not true, if we assume that meaning does not fly with sounds, nor is it transported in ink marks, etc., a fortiori we cannot say that I think the same as you.

So what is communication? This is my approach: Communication in this case is a mutual affectation where multiple meanings are created, but nothing is exchanged. It is a relationship of affectation around a third thing, but not of representation. The meaning, in the case of two speakers, is the third thing that maintains the relationship, it is an indeterminate third that is always differentiating and determining itself. It only appears and repeats itself as a third place, being pure virtuality. And if it is a third for two speakers, it is the fourth for three, and so on. Our interpretations of what the other person says [in the case of two speakers] refer to a third in terms of its pure tertiary, but indeterminated. Inside you and me this indeterminate virtual thirdness happens, and we gravitate to that, so to speak. That is the only thing that is repeated and remains the same: the third, the fourth, etc. for each case. We don't think the same [ I can always missunderstand you and think something totally different] but we share this thirdness as mutually happens to us.

When we talk about exchange we talk about something that passes from one side to the other while being the same. Like money, or a commodity. However, that does not happen with meaning and information. — JuanZu

Certainly.

If I talk to you, no matter how much you respond to me, your words (like sounds, sound waves) do not contain any meaning that travels through the air with them. — JuanZu

Exactly. They acquire a meaning only when they are processed by the mind, i.e. decoded and undestood,

In each moment the meaning is created as something new (that is why there can always be error in interpretation, a "wrong" meaning because it is always new). — JuanZu

This reminds me somehow of the incremental search used by the search engines! :grin:
I know what you mean. You are referring to the parts of a message, while it is transmitted by the sender, and its processing by the receiver. (BTW, note that this process is about the same in both oral and written forms. Not only you can read a message aloud but you can hear it in your mind.)
However, the message, the information is not complete and until the sender completes it. (Indeed, a frustrated "Let me finish, please" may come in if the listener interrupts the speaker.)
Anyway, this applies to live communications and in talking only.

In any case, a message, and the information it contains, is considered complete only when it is fully transmitted.

If you ask me something and I answer you, my answer in terms of exchange is as "empty" as your question. You may reply to me "but then there is no communication." — JuanZu

Can't get this.

normally when I hear your words – whether in the form of a question or in the form of an answer – I imagine that I am thinking the same thing as you but duplicated. — JuanZu

Well, I find all this a little too complicated. And why you keep rescticting communucation in oral form?

Communication in this case is a mutual affectation where multiple meanings are created, but nothing is exchanged. — JuanZu

Can't get this either. Sorry. Affectation implies pretense and/or conspicuousness. How does this enter in a simple, straightforward communication? In commmunication in its general sense, as it is commonly and widely used?

However, the message, the information is not complete and until the sender completes it. (Indeed, a frustrated "Let me finish, please" may come in if the listener interrupts the speaker.) — Alkis Piskas

I think I understand what you mean. You try to think of the situation as a whole. However, keep in mind that communication is never complete at once, it must be built. I can tell you something, but always, for whatever reason, my words may not reach their recipient. Perhaps the mistake is to conceive the meaning and information retroactively once the whole is constituted (as when a listener hears a sender and says "this is what he had thought", when in reality it cannot be the same). I prefer to say that the whole is a meaningful relationship where meaning emerges in various parts but is not the whole. Retroactivity is an erroneous causal inversion, where we imagine that the result (the message) was at the beginning.

Meaning is part of the whole, but it is not the whole. I think we both mean the same thing when you talk about a complete message. For it is certainly completed when it has meaningful effects. When I hear you, when I think I understand you, the message is already complete, but because it has already had its effects and a significant relationship has been established. However, I think it is impossible to say that the message is distributed among the interlocutors. Instead of the message I talk about the messages, in plural. The only thing that is maintained is the mutual relationship with respect to a third thing that is constantly being determined and differentiated.

If you ask me something and I answer you, my answer in terms of exchange is as "empty" as your question. You may reply to me "but then there is no communication."
— JuanZu
Can't get this — Alkis Piskas

What I mean is that the sounds, the ink marks, the file, the pixels, are empty in that they are devoid of meaning. They provoke meaning as soon as they enter into a relationship with a system of signs distinct in each case.

Well, I find all this a little too complicated. And why you keep rescticting communucation in oral form? — Alkis Piskas

Oral communication is just one example among others. I can also speak in the same way about letters. When you read a letter of mine that I have sent you (or an email), you imagine that the meaning you generate is the same as that of the sender (me). But in reality, because it is generated and created at the time of reading, it cannot be the same. Hence, I have raised the need to think about something that appears third and indeterminate.

Can't get this either. Sorry. Affectation implies pretense and/or conspicuousness. How does this enter in a simple, straightforward communication? In commmunication in its general sense, as it is commonly and widely used? — Alkis Piskas

If we talk about a letter, I mean that the ink marks affect you and produce effects on you (like another system of signs, in this case alive). These effects are the meaning, your inner language is affected and caused to be determined in x way: Something specific appears in your thought, some specific words arranged in a specific way.

I'm always open to and interested in new or different ideas. — Alkis Piskas

And yet you hide when one is presented to you on a silver plate:

...the reference has nothing to do with consciousness — Alkis Piskas

So be it.

I think we both mean the same thing when you talk about a complete message — JuanZu

Yes, maybe we do.

I'm certainly not hiding from anything. Neither do I hide anything. I'm a person who opens all his cards on the table and speak openly and clearly. And I expect that the person I communicate with does about the same.

You are a mysterious and obscure person, Banno.

It would be better that we don't communicate anymore with each other.

You are a mysterious and obscure person, Banno. — Alkis Piskas

Well, what I'm relating is pretty much standard OLP of the Oxbridge variety, a bit archaic, but perhaps a background for current ideas in analytic philosophy.

Let's go over it again.

There's an argument, found in Austin but implicit in Wittgenstein and Quine and others, pointing out that meaning is more than what is found in a lexical definition.

There's the observation, central to OLP but also found in other areas, that often what is at stake in a philosophical discussion is exactly the meaning of the terms involved, and in such case that stipulating definitions would be dogmatic and counterproductive.

There's an off-hand rejection of a certain pop philosophy as overly simplistic.

And a quote from Wittgenstein, used several times, reiterating the first point in this list: that there is a way of understanding the meanings of words that is not found in their lexical definitions.

What was obscure or mysterious here?

Or was your ire raised by my opinion of Kastrup?

Where is the information and meaning of these marks? I can use a magnifying glass or a microscope to examine these pixels and probably won't find anything like meaning. It is because of this problem that I speak of meaning as an effect of an effective and active relationship between signs. It follows that nothing is exchanged, but is constantly produced as something new. Right now, when you read this, you are creating meaning as an effect of "my" words. But I am certainly not sending you anything, I am simply provoking something in you in a technologically mediated relationship. This is very counterintuitive. — JuanZu

The "meaning of these marks" lies in the way they activate pattern recognizing neural networks in your brain, and the way those recognized patterns bring up associations in your mind. We don't find meaning looking at the words with a magnifying glass, because the meaning is a function of recognitions occurring in our brains.

I don't think this is the place to discuss the reductionism involved in conceiving meaning as simple brain processes. There is an association but no identification; and the association cannot be carried out without semantically, operationally and phenomenologically presupposing the term with which we want to associate the brain processes. Association is not identification. In any case it is quite off-topic to talk about this here.

It is relevant to the fact that for you...

This is very counterintuitive. — JuanZu

But I'm happy to drop it if you aren't interested.