Date: Thu, 22 Dec 1994 20:00:33 +0000
From: ucleaar <ucleaar@UCL.AC.UK>
Subject: Re: reply: (1) veridicality; (2) plurality
In-reply-to: (Your message of Tue, 20 Dec 94 12:26:26 MST.)
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To: Veijo Vilva <veion@XIRON.PC.HELSINKI.FI>
Reply-to: ucleaar <ucleaar@UCL.AC.UK>
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Chris:
> And:
> >I don't understand why you are reminded of this. The grammatically
> >determined meaning of "Sophy kissed Edgar" is, roughly, "at some
> >time prior to the utterance 'kissed', there were some event(s) of
> >kissing, the kisser being Sophy and the kissee being Edgar".
> >In context, of course, a whole lot more information can be implied
> >by such an utterance.
> A lot more, maybe, or something entirely different.  I'm puzzled by
> a theory of language which assigns a 'grammatically determined
> meaning' to a sentence which is different from its *real* meaning,
> i.e. the information it conveys in context.

Suppose I know you saw Sophy kiss Edgar, and I know you know she'd
been angry with him and refusing to have any physical contact with
him. I say to you "Sophy kissed Edgar", as a result of which you
realize that Sophy must have forgiven Edgar --- that is the context-
dependent meaning.
Now, I ask you: Where do you think the information "at some time
prior to the utterance 'kissed', there were some event(s) of kissing,
the kisser being Sophy and the kissee being Edgar" fits in? Does
this have anything to do with the meaning of the utterance?
Next, where in the grammar are the rules that tell you "Given the
sentence 'Sophy kissed Edgar', derive the proposition that Sophy
has forgiven Edgar"? Nowhere. There are no such rules.
Next, where in the grammar are the rules that tell you "Given the
sentence 'Sophy kissed Edgar', derive the proposition that at some
time prior to the utterance 'kissed', there were some event(s) of
kissing, the kisser being Sophy and the kissee being Edgar'"? Had
I enough time and intelligence I'd write out the grammar of
English and point out the relevant rules to you.

> I think what John is vocalizing better than I could is that it
> seems strange to hold what you call the grammatical meaning in such
> reverence, when it depends on artificially removing a sentence from
> the very context that makes it meaningful.

What have I said to indicate that I hold semantics in especial
reverence (or pragmatics in contempt)?

> If the 'grammatical meaning' is not influenced by the context, then
> it's an artificial construct that bears little relation to real human
> communication.

What are your arguments? I say the grammar says "'twenty' means 20",
and that a general theory of communication, such as Sperber & Wilson's
Relevance Theory, can explain how, if the grammar says what I say
it does, in a given context the utterance "twenty" can mean
'approximately 20', or 'give me another banana'.

> Take your chess analogy -- I think he's arguing that language is
> *not* like chess; it would be more like a game where the rules can
> change somewhat based on the strategy a player chooses.

What can I say? The only way to resolve the issue is to go and do
some linguistics based on those assumptions. As you must be aware,
linguistics is extremely pluralistic and heterogeneous (and
criticized for being so), but even so I'm not aware of any approach
that takes your assumptions. (That's not to say noone is taking
such an approach, of course.) I'd suggest this is because your
assumptions are untenable.

> .i ko bazi ba'o .a'o bilma

I am considerably improved, thank you, and hoping to discover some
gluttony in time for Crimbo.

------
And