Semantic Externalism, Language Variation, and Sociolinguistic Accommodation
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Mind and World: Beyond the Externalism/Internalism Debate
Research Proposal Mind and World: Beyond the Externalism/Internalism Debate Sanjit Chakraborty Research Scholar Department of Philosophy Jadavpur University Background For the last few years the concept of the natural kind terms has haunted me. My main concern has been regarding the location of the meaning of these terms. Are meanings of the natural kind terms in the head or in the world? This question has been the most pressing in Philosophy of Mind and Philosophy of Language. I have realized that we cannot separate mind from the world. I had in the beginning only a layman‟s conception regarding mind, meaning and the world. When I entered the field of philosophy inspired by Hilary Putnam, I found that semantic externalism is a vexing issue involving a vast area. The location of content is at the core of the metaphysical debate regarding internalism and externalism in the sense that internalists believe that mental proprieties are intrinsic only if they preserve across world identity of internal replicas. Externalism is opposed to this thinking. For externalists, mental properties are in many cases dependent on physical or social environment. The linguistic strategy also maintains a difference between internalism and externalism regarding the mental content. Descriptivism focuses on general terms that consist in descriptive content and leads to mode of presentation of reference through sense. Besides, the causal theory of reference refutes descriptivism to ensure that there is a causal chain of reference between words and 1 objects that help us to identify agent‟s thought through an identification of its relation with external environment. -
The Book of Chuang Tzu Free
FREE THE BOOK OF CHUANG TZU PDF Chuang Tzu,Zhuangzi,Martin Palmer | 352 pages | 01 Dec 2007 | Penguin Books Ltd | 9780140455373 | English | London, United Kingdom Zhuangzi (book) - Wikipedia READ as many books as you like Personal use. One of the great founders of Taoism, Chaung Tzu lived in the fourth century BC and is among the most enjoyable and intriguing personalities in the whole of Chinese philosophy. The Way of Chuang Tzu Book Summary : Chuang Tzuu considered, along with Lao Tzu, one of the great figures of early Taoist thoughtu used parables and anecdotes, allegory and paradox, to illustrate that real happiness and freedom are found only in understanding the Tao or Way of nature, and The Book of Chuang Tzu in its unity. The respected Trappist monk Thomas Merton spent several years reading and reflecting upon four different translations of the Chinese classic that bears Chuang Tzu's name. The result is this collection of poetic renderings of the great sage's work that conveys its spirit in a way no other translation has and that was Merton's personal favorite among his more than The Book of Chuang Tzu books. Both prose and verse are included here, as well as a short section from Merton discussing the most salient themes of Chuang Tzu's teachings. The Inner Chapters are the only sustained section of this text widely believed to be the work of Chuang Tzu himself, dating to the fourth century B. Witty and engaging, spiced with the lyricism of poetry, Chuang Tzu's Taoist insights are timely and eternal, profoundly concerned with spiritual ecology. -
'Putnam on Bivs and Radical Scepticism'
For Putnam on Brains in Vats, (ed.) S. Goldberg, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). ‘PUTNAM ON BIVS AND RADICAL SCEPTICISM’ DUNCAN PRITCHARD & CHRIS RANALLI University of Edinburgh & National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) ABSTRACT. The aim of this paper is to explore Putnam’s influential ‘BIV’ argument against radical scepticism, both as he presents this argument and as it has subsequently been reconstructed. §1 explores the BIV argument as Putnam presents it and the anti-sceptical morals that he extracts from this argument. §2 examines a core critique of the argument, so conceived, from Anthony Brueckner. §3 then critically evaluates an influential reconstruction of Putnam’s argument, due to Crispin Wright. §4-5 explores the idea that Putnam’s argument is best thought of as a transcendental response to radical scepticism, and accordingly applies Stroud’s challenge to transcendental arguments to this proposal. Finally, §6 examines an influential criticism of Putnam’s argument which is due to Nagel. 1. PUTNAM’S BIV ARGUMENT A familiar way of arguing for radical scepticism is by appeal to radical sceptical hypotheses, such as the hypothesis that one might be a brain-in-vat (BIV) which is being radically, and undetectably, deceived about its environment. Roughly, the sceptical argument goes that since such sceptical hypotheses are by their nature indistinguishable from normal experience, so one cannot know that they are false. Furthermore, if one cannot know that they are false, then it follows that one can’t know much of what one believes, most of which is inconsistent with radical sceptical hypotheses. This last step will almost certainly require some sort of closure-style principle, whereby knowledge is closed under known entailments. -
Macro-Sociolinguistics Page 1 MACRO SOCIOLINGUISTICS
MACRO SOCIOLINGUISTICS: INSIGHT LANGUAGE Rohib Adrianto Sangia Abstract: Language can be studied internally and externally. As externally, Sociolinguistics as the branch of linguistics looked or put position in relation to language speakers in the community, because in human society is no longer as individuals, will remain as a social community. Sociolinguistics concerns with two aspects of civilization, language and society, there are appropriate terms which are micro and macro in sociolinguistics. The main differences of them are micro-sociolinguistics or sociolinguistics –in narrow sense- is the study of language in relation to society, while macro-sociolinguistics or the sociology of language is the study of society in relation to language. Macro-sociolinguistics focuses such as social factors, exactly the interaction between language and dialect, the study of the decline and stabilization of minority languages, bilingualism developmental stability in a particular group. Keywords: Language, Sociolinguistics, Macro Sociolinguistics, Bilingualism. INTRODUCTION Language is a communication tool that people use to interact with each other. By mastering the language of humans can know the content of the world through science and new knowledge and had never imagined before. As a means of communication and interaction that is only possessed by humans, language can be studied internally and externally (Thomason and Kaufman, 1988: 22). Internally means the study made against internal elements such as language course, the structure of phonological, morphological, and syntactical alone. While externally meaningful study was conducted to things or factors outside the language, but in the use of language itself, speech community or the environment. Language may refer to the specific capacity in humans to obtain and use a complex system of communication, or to a specific agency of a complex communication system. -
Externalism and a Priori Knowledge of the World: Why Privileged Access Is Not the Issue Maria Lasonen-Aarnio
Externalism and a priori knowledge of the world: Why privileged access is not the issue Maria Lasonen-Aarnio This is the pre-peer reviewed version of the following article: Lasonen-Aarnio, M. (2006), Externalism and A Priori Knowledge of the World: Why Privileged Access is Not the Issue. Dialectica, 60: 433– 445, which has been published in final form at http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1746-8361.2006.01086.x/abstract Abstract: I look at incompatibilist arguments aimed at showing that the conjunction of the thesis that a subject has privileged, a priori access to the contents of her own thoughts, on the one hand, and of semantic externalism, on the other, lead to a putatively absurd conclusion, namely, a priori knowledge of the external world. I focus on arguments involving a variety of externalism resulting from the singularity or object-dependence of certain terms such as the demonstrative ‘that’. McKinsey argues that incompatibilist arguments employing such externalist theses are at their strongest, and conclusively show that privileged access must be rejected. While I agree on the truth of the relevant externalist theses, I show that all plausible versions of the incompatibilist reductio argument as applied to such theses are fundamentally flawed, for these versions of the argument must make assumptions that lead to putatively absurd knowledge of the external world independently of the thesis of privileged access. 1. Michael McKinsey has argued that semantic externalism is incompatible with the thesis that subjects have privileged, a priori access to the contents of their own thoughts.1 The incompatibility is supposed to result from the fact that the conjunction of the two theses leads to a putatively absurd conclusion, namely, the possibility of a priori knowledge of the external world. -
AN INTRODUCTION to SOCIOLINGUISTICS Blackwell Textbooks in Linguistics
AN INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLINGUISTICS Blackwell Textbooks in Linguistics The books included in this series provide comprehensive accounts of some of the most central and most rapidly developing areas of research in linguistics. Intended primarily for introductory and post-introductory students, they include exercises, discussion points and suggestions for further reading. 1. Liliane Haegeman, Introduction to Government and Binding Theory (Second Edition) 2. Andrew Spencer, Morphological Theory 3. Helen Goodluck, Language Acquisition 4. Ronald Wardhaugh and Janet M. Fuller, An Introduction to Sociolinguistics (Seventh Edition) 5. Martin Atkinson, Children’s Syntax 6. Diane Blakemore, Understanding Utterances 7. Michael Kenstowicz, Phonology in Generative Grammar 8. Deborah Schiffrin, Approaches to Discourse 9. John Clark, Colin Yallop, and Janet Fletcher, An Introduction to Phonetics and Phonology (Third Edition) 10. Natsuko Tsujimura, An Introduction to Japanese Linguistics (Third Edition) 11. Robert D. Borsley, Modern Phrase Structure Grammar 12. Nigel Fabb, Linguistics and Literature 13. Irene Heim and Angelika Kratzer, Semantics in Generative Grammar 14. Liliane Haegeman and Jacqueline Guéron, English Grammar: A Generative Perspective 15. Stephen Crain and Diane Lillo-Martin, An Introduction to Linguistic Theory and Language Acquisition 16. Joan Bresnan, Lexical-Functional Syntax 17. Barbara A. Fennell, A History of English: A Sociolinguistic Approach 18. Henry Rogers, Writing Systems: A Linguistic Approach 19. Benjamin W. Fortson IV, Indo-European Language and Culture: An Introduc- tion (Second Edition) 20. Liliane Haegeman, Thinking Syntactically: A Guide to Argumentation and Analysis 21. Mark Hale, Historical Linguistics: Theory and Method 22. Henning Reetz and Allard Jongman, Phonetics: Transcription, Production, Acoustics and Perception 23. Bruce Hayes, Introductory Phonology 24. -
3 Cartesian Skepticism, Content Externalism, and Self-Knowledge
3 CARTESIAN SKEPTICISM, CONTENT EXTERNALISM, AND SELF-KNOWLEDGE Anthony Brueckner* SÍNTESE – Há um argumento cético clássico ABSTRACT – There is a classical skeptical derivado das Meditações sobre a filosofia primei- argument that derives from Descartes’s ra. Este artigo oferece uma formulação contem- Meditations on first Philosophy. This paper offers porânea padrão do argumento, pretendendo a standard contemporary formulation of the mostrar que ninguém sabe qualquer coisa sobre o argument, which purports to show that no one mundo extramental. A obra de Hilary Putnam na knows anything about the world that exists filosofia da linguagem e da mente parece fornecer outside our minds. The work of Hilary Putnam in uma resposta a uma versão atualizada do argu- the philosophy of language and mind seems to mento cético cartesiano. Em sua maior parte, afford an answer to an updated version of the este artigo é dedicado a uma análise e crítica das Cartesian skeptical argument. The bulk of this meditações anti-céticas de Putnam. paper is devoted to an analysis and critique of PALAVRAS-CHAVE – Descartes. Putnam. Ceti- Putnam’s anti-skeptical meditations. cismo. Cérebros em cubas. Externalismo de KEY WORDS – Descartes, Putnam, Skepticism, conteúdo. Brains in vats, Content externalism. 1 The Cartesian Skeptical Argument Let us start by considering an updated version of the skeptical concerns that Descartes raised in the first Meditation.1 Imagine a living brain floating in a vat of nutrient fluids while attached to a supercomputer. The computer is programmed to provide electrical stimuli to the brain that are just like those a normal brain receives due to input to the sense-organs connected to the normal brain. -
Semantic Externalism and Self Knowledge: Privileged Access to the World
3 Semantic Externalism and Self Knowledge: Privileged Access to the World Submitted for the degree of PhD Sarah Ann Sawyer King’s College London September 1997 3 Acknowledgements I would like to thank David Papineau for a multitude of comments and suggestions on all aspects of the thesis. I would also like to thank Christoph Hörl and Mark Sainsbury for comments on the final draft, and Sean Crawford for extensive discussion of the nature of de re thought. Special thanks go to my parents for providing a solid basis from which to work. 3 Abstract The thesis is concerned to defend the compatibility of two plausible claims about the mind; semantic externalism and privileged access. It is further concerned to demonstrate one important implication of the conjunction of semantic externalism and privileged access, an implication which forces the rejection of the dichotomy between knowledge of one’s mind and knowledge of one’s world. Chapter one is a presentation of semantic externalism. Chapter two is a presentation of the claim of privileged access. The claim of privileged access is formulated in response to the following question. How can a subject have privileged access to the contents of her thoughts given that her thoughts depend essentially on contingent facts about her world of which she could have empirical knowledge only? Chapter three is concerned with the following implication, the consequent of which is prima facie absurd. If the contents of the mind depend essentially upon contingent facts about the world, knowledge of the semantic contents “within” can yield knowledge of the world “without”. -
Introduction: Sociolinguistics and Computer-Mediated Communication
Journal of Sociolinguistics 10/4, 2006: 419–438 Introduction: Sociolinguistics and computer-mediated communication Jannis Androutsopoulos University of Hannover, Germany This theme issue of Journal of Sociolinguistics comprises a number of empirical studies focusing on a range of ways in which people use language in computer-mediated communication (CMC). This introduction contextualizes the contributions to this issue by providing an outline of linguistically focused CMC studies. A critique of the research on the ‘language of CMC’ is given, and aspects of CMC research from a sociolinguistic viewpoint are presented: the move from the ‘language of CMC’ to socially situated computer- mediated discourse; its grounding in the notion of online community; and the application of sociolinguistic methodologies to its study. It is argued that CMC provides a new empirical arena for various research traditions in sociolinguistics; conversely, sociolinguistics can contribute to the interdisciplinary theorizing of CMC by demonstrating the role of language useandlinguisticvariabilityintheconstructionofinterpersonalrelationships and social identities on the Internet. KEYWORDS: Computer-mediated communication, sociolinguistics ‘WEBSLANG’ AND ‘NETSPEAK’: CHALLENGING NEW LANGUAGE MYTHS In early 2005 the Bild, Germany’s most popular tabloid newspaper, launched on its website a series of quizzes dedicated to language use on the Internet. Bearing headings such as ‘Do you understand Internet slang?’ and ‘Do you speak Chattish?’ these quizzes consist of a mixture -
The Limits of Meaning: Social Indexicality, Variation, and the Cline of Interiority
The limits of meaning: Social indexicality, variation, and the cline of interiority Penelope Eckert Language, Volume 95, Number 4, December 2019, pp. 751-776 (Article) Published by Linguistic Society of America For additional information about this article https://muse.jhu.edu/article/743105 Access provided at 17 Dec 2019 23:13 GMT from Linguistic Society of America THE LIMITS OF MEANING: SOCIAL INDEXICALITY, VARIATION, AND THE CLINE OF INTERIORITY Penelope Eckert Stanford University The structural focus of linguistics has led to a static and modular treatment of meaning. View - ing language as practice allows us to transcend the boundaries of subdisciplines that deal with meaning and to integrate the social indexicality of variation into this larger system. This article presents the expression of social meaning as a continuum of decreasing reference and increasing performativity, with sociolinguistic variation at the performative extreme. The meaning potential of sociolinguistic variables in turn is based in their form and their social source, constituting a cline of ‘interiority’ from variables that index public social facts about the speaker to more inter - nal, personal affective states.* Keywords : variation, social meaning, semantics, pragmatics, iconicity, indexicality, semiotics ‘I have resisted the term sociolinguistics for many years, since it implies that there can be a successful linguistic theory or practice which is not social.’ (Labov 1972:13) 1. Introduction . Language is a social practice, a dialectic between structure and agency: structure constrains action, and action in turn reproduces structure. As Giddens (1984:2) puts it, ‘In and through their activities agents reproduce the conditions that make these activities possible’. -
Understanding Meaning and World
Understanding Meaning and World Understanding Meaning and World: A Relook on Semantic Externalism By Sanjit Chakraborty Understanding Meaning and World: A Relook on Semantic Externalism By Sanjit Chakraborty This book first published 2016 Cambridge Scholars Publishing Lady Stephenson Library, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE6 2PA, UK British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Copyright © 2016 by Sanjit Chakraborty All rights for this book reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the prior permission of the copyright owner. ISBN (10): 1-4438-9103-7 ISBN (13): 978-1-4438-9103-5 To my Gurudev Hilary Putnam, Who taught me how to love philosophy a little more... Without whom not! CONTENTS Acknowledgements .................................................................................... ix Introduction ................................................................................................. 1 Chapter One ................................................................................................. 7 The Internalism-Externalism Debate in Contemporary Philosophy of Language and Mind Introduction (1.1) Contemporary Debate: Internalism Verses Externalism (1.2) Descriptivism of Frege and Russell (1.3) Putnam’s and Kripke’s Theses on Reference (1.4) Putnam on Externalism Concluding Remarks Chapter Two ............................................................................................. -
Westphal Says That His Exhibition of Two Sources of a Commitment in Kant to Mental Content Externalism Ought to Be Understood
Can Mental Content Externalism Prove Realism?1 (Axel Mueller, Northwestern University) Recently, Kenneth Westphal has presented a highly interesting and innovative reading of Kant's critical philosophy.2 This reading continues a tradition of Kant- scholarship of which, e.g., Paul Guyer's work is representative, and in which the anti- idealistic potential of Kant's critical philosophy is pitted against its idealistic self- understanding. Much of the work in this tradition leaves matters at observing the tensions this introduces in Kant's work. But Westphal's proposed interpretation goes farther. Its attractiveness derives for the most part from the promise that it permits an internal critique of Kant's transcendental idealism (TI), that is, a critique that is based on the very resources of Kantian transcendental philosophy.3 In contrast to these resources, which currently seem to go through a sort of revival in an enormous array of fields, TI is notorious for dismaying even sympathetic interpreters. How attractive and needed such an internal critique of TI would be becomes all the more patent when we place such a promise in the context of some of the contemporary discussions about TI after Allison's famous defense of it. Before directly engaging with Westphal's interpretation, I would therefore like to quickly sketch on what background it acquires its force (I). After characterizing the main features of Westphal's view (II), and supporting it in more detail by an account of Kant's theory of cognitive significance (III), I then want to review the extent of its success to present Kant as issuing an anti-skeptical argument (IV.1), or semantic views that are incompatible with TI (IV.2), or a 'proof of not merely empirical realism' (IV.3).