Muchamad Adam Basori, M.A. TESOL
5 November 2011
Meeting 8
Background
Thing referred to an particular occasion of utterance is called referent.
Set of things that could be referred to using a particular predicate is called extension.
Thing typically referred to using a particular predicate is called prototype.
Introduction
In order to be able to talk meaningfully about anything, it is necessary to agree on the meanings of the words involved. This is a truism.
In everyday life, people reach practical agreement on the meanings of almost all the words they use, and effective and successful communication takes place as a result. If a person wants to hinder or obstruct communication, he can begin to quibble over (argue something although it is not important) the meanings of everyday words. Although there may be disagreement about the fine details of the meanings of words ‘around the edges’, we find in the everyday use of language that all words are understood by speakers as having an indispensable hard core of meaning.
Example 1
A: ‘I saw something strange in the garden this morning.’
B: ‘Oh! What was it?’
A: ‘An animal perched on top of the clothes pole.’
B: ‘How do you know it was an animal?’
A: ‘I saw it. It was a cat.’
B: ‘You might have seen a cat, but how can you be sure it was an animal?’
A: ‘Well, of course it was an animal, if it was a cat.’
B: ‘I don’t see how that follows.’
Example 2
B: ‘My neighbour’s child is an adult.’
A: ‘You mean he was a child and is now grown up?’
B: ‘No. He is still a child, even though he’s an adult.’
A: ‘You mean that he’s a child who acts in a very grown up way?’
B: ‘No. He’s just an adult child, that’s all.’
Example 3
B: ‘I finally killed Ben’s parrot.’
A: ‘So it’s dead, then?’
B: ‘No, I didn’t say that. Just that I killed it.’
A: ‘But if you killed it, it must be dead.’
B: ‘No. I was quite careful about it. I killed it very carefully so it’s not dead.’
Answers and Comments
(1) The meaning of cat includes that of animal.
(2) The meaning of adult excludes the meaning of child.
(3) The meaning of kill is related to that of dead in such a way that anything killed is necessarily dead.
The kind of meaning we are talking about here is obviously the kind associated with words and sentences by the language system, and not the speaker meaning (see Unit 1) specifically associated with utterances made by speakers on particular occasions. This kind of meaning we call SENSE.
The SENSE of an expression is its indispensable hard core of meaning.
This definition deliberately excludes any influence of context or situation of utterance on the senses of expressions.
The sense of an expression can be thought of as the sum of its sense properties and sense relations with other expressions. For the moment, we will concentrate on three important sense properties of sentences, the properties of being analytic, of being synthetic, and of being contradictory.
Definition
An ANALYTIC sentence is one that is necessarily TRUE, as a result of the senses of the words in it. An analytic sentence, therefore, reflects a tacit (unspoken) agreement by speakers of the language about the senses of the words in it.
A SYNTHETIC sentence is one which is NOT analytic, but may be either true or false, depending on the way the world is.
Example
Analytic: All elephants are animals
The truth of the sentence follows from the senses of elephant and animal.
Synthetic: John is from Ireland
There is nothing in the senses of John or Ireland or from which makes this necessarily true or false.
Classroom Practices
Label the following sentences either T for true, F for false, or D for don’t know, as appropriate.
(a) Cats are animals T / F / D
(b) Bachelors are unmarried T / F / D
(c) Cats never live more than 20 years T / F / D
(d) Bachelors cannot form lasting relationships T / F / D
(e) Cats are not vegetables T / F / D
(f) Bachelors are male T / F / D
(g) No cat likes to bathe T / F / D
(h) Bachelors are lonely T / F / D
Answers
(a) T (a, b, e, f are analytic.)
(b) T (c, d, g, h are synthetic.)
(c) D
(d) D
(e) T
(f) T
(g) D
(h) D
Comment
Analytic sentences are always true (necessarily so, by virtue of the senses of the words in them), whereas synthetic sentences can be sometimes true, sometimes false, depending on the circumstances. We now come to contradiction.
Definition
A CONTRADICTION is a sentence that is necessarily FALSE, as a result of the senses of the words in it. Thus a contradiction is in a way the opposite of an analytic sentence.
For example, This animal is a vegetable is a contradiction.
This must be false because of the senses of animal and vegetable.
Comments
Analytic sentences can be formed from contradictions, and vice versa, by the insertion or removal, as appropriate, of the negative particle word not.
We pay no attention here to the figurative use of both analytic sentences and contradictions. Taken literally, the sentence That man is not a human being is a contradiction. This very fact is what gives it its power to communicate a strong emotional judgement in a figurative use (stronger than, say, the synthetic That man is very cruel).
We will now mention a limitation of the notions analytic, synthetic, and contradiction. Remember that these notions are defined in terms of truth.
Imperative and interrogative sentences cannot be true or false, and so they cannot be analytic (because they cannot be true), or synthetic, because ‘synthetic’ only makes sense in contrast to the notion ‘analytic’.
You will have noticed that synthetic sentences are potentially informative in real-world situations, whereas analytic sentences and contradictions are not informative to anyone who already knows the meaning of the words in them.
It might be thought that the fact that semanticists concentrate attention on unusual sentences, such as analytic ones and contradictions, reflects a lack of interest in ordinary, everyday language. Quite the contrary! Semanticists are interested in the foundations of everyday communication.
People can only communicate meaningfully about everyday matters, using informative synthetic sentences, because (or to the extent that) they agree on the meanings of the words in them.
This basic agreement on meaning is reflected in analytic sentences, which is what makes them of great interest to semanticists.
The notions analytic, synthetic, and contradiction each apply to individual sentences. Analyticity, syntheticity, and contradiction are, then, SENSE PROPERTIES of sentences.
For example:
That man is human has the sense property of analyticity (or of being analytic).
That man is tall has the sense property of syntheticity (or of being synthetic).
That man is a woman has the sense property of being a contradiction.
Note the interdependence of sense relations and sense properties. Sense properties of sentences (e.g. analyticity) depend on the sense properties of, and the sense relations between, the words they contain.
The sense relation between the predicates man and human is known as hyponymy, a kind of sense inclusion relationship between predicates.
The sense relation between the predicates man and woman is a kind of antonymy, or oppositeness.
The sense structure of a language is like a network, in which the senses of all elements are, directly or indirectly, related to the senses of all other elements in these and other kinds of ways.
Definition
The STEREOTYPE of a predicate is a list of the TYPICAL characteristics or features of things to which the predicate may be applied.
A stereotype is related to a prototype (see previous unit) but is not the same thing. A prototype of elephant is some actual elephant, whereas the stereotype of elephant is a list of characteristics which describes the prototype. The stereotype of a predicate may often specify a range of possibilities (e.g. the range of colours of typical cats), but an individual prototype of this predicate will necessarily take some particular place within this range (e.g. black).
Another important difference between prototype and stereotype is that a speaker may well know a stereotype for some predicate, such as ghost, witchdoctor, flying saucer, but not actually be acquainted with any prototypes of it. Stereotypes of expressions for things learnt about at second hand, through descriptions rather than direct experience, are generally known in this way.
The relationships between stereotype, prototype, sense, and extension are summarized very briefly in the chart.
| Thing(or set of things) specified specification | Abstract Specification | |
| Pertaining to all examples | EXTENSION | SENSE |
| Pertaining to typical examples | PROTOTYPE | STEREOTYPE |
Important though the notion of stereotype is in everyday language, it is obviously not so basic to meaning as the idea of sense, which we have defined as an indispensable hard core of meaning.
Summary
The sense of an expression can be thought of as the sum of its sense properties and sense relations. Sense properties of sentences include those of being analytic, synthetic, and a contradiction.
Stereotypes defined in terms of typical characteristics account for the fact that people usually agree on the meanings of the words they use.
Sense and Relations (1)
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Thanks for the reference....
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