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Article 3831 of comp.ai.philosophy:
Xref: newshub.ccs.yorku.ca comp.ai.philosophy:3831 sci.philosophy.tech:2157
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>From: ske@pkmab.se (Kristoffer Eriksson)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy,sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: Is understanding algorithmic?
Message-ID: <6581@pkmab.se>
Date: 15 Feb 92 12:27:36 GMT
References: <1992Jan28.122457.8161@husc3.harvard.edu> <6537@pkmab.se> <1992Feb9.053036.8640@husc3.harvard.edu>
Organization: Peridot Konsult i Mellansverige AB, Oerebro, Sweden
Lines: 128

In article <1992Feb9.053036.8640@husc3.harvard.edu> zeleny@zariski.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:
>Sorry I'm running late with substantive replies: the chickens have all come
>home to roost, and a lot of my present writing has to be done for academic
>credit.

Maybe if you concentrated a little more on substantive replies, and a little
less on duelling with words with any and all responsive victim in sight...

>MZ:
>>> *aliquid stat pro aliquo*.
>
>Well, my latin is rather minimal, but there are some clich\'es one
>traditionally states in the original language... try doing like I do, and
>look them up.

Well, that is rather hard without a latin dictionary or other suitable
compilations. I tried my english dictionary, which does list some common
latin phrases, but this one wasn't there. And I am not going to make a
trip to the city library just because of an unimportant thing like this.
Thus our discussion brakes down here.

>MZ:
>>>on one hand ... purely denotative signs ... one would be forced to postulate
>>>a causal relation in virtue of which these signs denote, stipulating that
>>>this causal relation is itself entirely immanent in nervous activity, in
>>>direct contradiction to the fact that our language, allegedly founded
>>>solely on such nervous activity, has no trouble referring to objects and
>>>phenomena that occur outside of the latter.
>>
>>>On the other hand ... connotative signs, ... Now, as I have argued elsewhere
>>>on the Putnam thread, it's well known that intensions, once admitted, bring
>>>in a transfinite hierarchy thereof; in other words, on the connotative theory,
>>>reference depends on the grasp of (and, under the reductive materialist
>>>assumption, physical embodiment of) meanings, which depend on meanings of
>>>meanings, which in turn depend on meanings of meanings of meanings, and so
>>>on.
>
>KE:
>>You consider two ways of viewing signs, and for each one you conclude that
>>it doesn't work out. It appears to me that you have not ruled out one simple
>>solution that immediately suggested itself to me: use them both! They seem
>>to complement each other, such that each of them takes care of the other ones
>>problems, at least the ones you presented.

>Why would this change anything?

As I said: because they seem to complement each other, as far as I can
understand.

>  Your suggestion is somewhat similar in
>spirit to the Russellian method of eliminating descriptions and "apparent
>names" interpreted as abbreviations for clusters thereof (e.g. `Sir Walter
>Scott' --> the author of "Waverley" + an acquaintance of George IV + ...),
>but treating "logically proper names" as denoting directly, without the
>mediation of a descriptive content (strictly speaking, his is not a
>connotative theory, as the apparent connotation is explained away as mere
>ellipsis).  Still, there remains the problem of just how the logically
>proper names are supposed to denote.

You yourself described somewhat how denotative signs might denote, except
that you immediately went on to note a failure of that explanation, without
clearly observing that that failure does not invalidate the explanation per
se, but only proves that there is a certain class of cases that it does not
cover.

Also note that these are not just any "logically proper names" on a paper
or spoken out aloud, but also have the brain hardware to actually support
their connection with that which they denote.

>KE:
>>Suppose the meaning of connotative signs eventually terminate in denotative
>>signs, which in turn have a causal relation with attributes of the external
>>world through our senses. Through our senses, we can have denotative signs
>>refering to simple attributes of the external world, like colors, shapes,
>>sounds, touch and so on, which are well suited to build connotative signs
>>on (thereby solving the problems of connotative signs), that can, in essence,
>>use these denotative signs to describe any imaginable kind of referent whether
>>ever directly experienced or not (thereby solving the problems of denotative
>>signs).
>
>Well, this is, in effect, what Russell said: logically proper names can
>only denote such entities as we are directly acquainted with, i.e.
>sense-data, universals, and our own selves.  Trouble is, even if you accept
>this view, how would my ability to name the yellow spot in my field of
>vision explain my apparent ability to refer to an external object causing
>that spot?  Keep in mind the unlimited variety of phenomenal impressions a
>given object may produce...

How about using a description of that object? "The yellow spot encountered
<then> and <there>" is such a description, if that is all you know about it.
When you learn more about it, you can add more details. For instance "The
yellow spot with <such> shape <then> and <there>, which is sometimes bright
and sometime dark." The description starts to take on the character of a
model, from which you can derive the various impressions that the object
can give you under all known circumstances, for instance "sometimes bright"
and "sometimes dark", and "round seen from above", "<some other shape> from
the side", and "lights up when I press this button <there>", "hot when
bright", "generally called 'lamp', specificially 'my bedroom lamp'." All
these description are associated to the original yellow spot as experience
accumulates.

Surely the variety of phenomenal impressions that a given object may produce
is not really unlimited. Carrots never gave me the impression of tasting
good, for instance. That's a limit.

Do you feel that there is something more and above this to your apparent
ability to refer to this yellow lamp? Do you think something more is needed
to establish the connection between the connotative sign "my bedroom lamp"
and your bedroom lamp, bypassing the denotative descriptions that it reduces
to?

I would like to stress that even though "denotative signs or 'logically proper
names' only can denote such entities as we are directly acquainted with", my
claim is that when put together into descriptions, they can single out both
the objects that are connected with those experiences, and objects we have
never experienced ourselves (as long as we have some handle on how to
describe them), and even objects that do not exist at all. The meaning is
the combination of the denotative signs in the description.

Also, there needn't be any distinct borderline between the possibility that
a denotative sign refers the some sense experience itself, and the object
that stimulates our senses into reporting this experience, except that you
may want to add some more qualifiers to this experience if you want to
distinguish it from other similar experiences during other circumstances.
-- 
Kristoffer Eriksson, Peridot Konsult AB, Hagagatan 6, S-703 40 Oerebro, Sweden
Phone: +46 19-13 03 60  !  e-mail: ske@pkmab.se
Fax:   +46 19-11 51 03  !  or ...!{uunet,mcsun}!mail.swip.net!kullmar!pkmab!ske


