So you want to be a robot,
Hell, that's ok with me,
Just don't spoutin' around
All yir goddamn hypocracy,
Just tell me the truth - I'll grant you self-worth
Oh, what's that? You're still obsessed with Kalie and Matt Dirth?
I don't give a goddamn about all the things you done,
show me what you are and I'll say, "That's a son of a son."
Is your life based on the Prestige
Or are you lookin' for Armageddon' pls,
This shit ain't over,
Til' I got a gun and a fuckin' hangover,
That would justify all the bad things I've done,
Oh, God help me, I'm just a son of a son.
(Freestyle lyrics on forum don't really don't that good, huh?) hah!
Everyone is a robot, it's just up to us to decide how clever and enjoyable we are.
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 23, 2007, 10:58:42 PM
Everyone is a robot, it's just up to us to decide how clever and enjoyable we are.
I dissagree.
Quote from: Satans_Santa on January 23, 2007, 10:34:21 PM
So you want to be a robot,
Hell, that's ok with me,
Just don't spoutin' around
All yir goddamn hypocracy,
Just tell me the truth - I'll grant you self-worth
Oh, what's that?  You're still obsessed with Kalie and Matt Dirth?
I don't give a goddamn about all the things you done,
show me what you are and I'll say, "That's a son of a son."
Is your life based on the Prestige
Or are you lookin' for Armageddon' pls,
This shit ain't over,
Til' I got a gun and a fuckin' hangover,
That would justify all the bad things I've done,
Oh, God help me, I'm just a son of a son.
(Freestyle lyrics on forum don't really don't that good, huh?) hah!
on the contrary, I think you and LHX should team up. Also ECH once he becomes regular.
Quote from: Buddhist_Monk_Wannabe on January 24, 2007, 02:45:41 PM
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 23, 2007, 10:58:42 PM
Everyone is a robot, it's just up to us to decide how clever and enjoyable we are.
I dissagree.
On grounds of defnitions, I suspect. What parts do you disagree with and why, or else I can't really defend it.
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 24, 2007, 08:56:24 PM
Quote from: Buddhist_Monk_Wannabe on January 24, 2007, 02:45:41 PM
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 23, 2007, 10:58:42 PM
Everyone is a robot, it's just up to us to decide how clever and enjoyable we are.
I dissagree.
On grounds of defnitions, I suspect. What parts do you disagree with and why, or else I can't really defend it.
On the grounds that 1) I am a human and I'm neither a "worker" nor a slave, doing someone elses bidding, or at least if I can help it, and 2) because it sounds too much like that "biology is all little machines" creationist propaganda. The first point is dismissal of the arguement, and the second point is simply a feeling.
I would say everything that makes decisions and carries them out is a robot, all somewhere on a spectrum of sophistication, makeup, and function. Creationism is a conflationary argument and therefore irrelevant, and arguing an emotional standpoint = inferior.
What did I hear the other day?  Oh, that humans had to re-engineer their biologies to do the industrial/sit-down work of today from our hunter/gather/agrarian pursuits of yesteryear.
That the more "robotic" and repetitive our motions were for work, the more we re-focused our brains to perform these actions over and over and over.
Damn but I forget where I heard this shit.  Feh.
The robot I would have designed would be able to replicate, mutate, and have inheritability of traits.
'Nuff said.
Quote from: Buddhist_Monk_Wannabe on January 24, 2007, 10:52:46 PM
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 24, 2007, 08:56:24 PM
Quote from: Buddhist_Monk_Wannabe on January 24, 2007, 02:45:41 PM
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 23, 2007, 10:58:42 PM
Everyone is a robot, it's just up to us to decide how clever and enjoyable we are.
I dissagree.
On grounds of defnitions, I suspect. What parts do you disagree with and why, or else I can't really defend it.
On the grounds that 1) I am a human and I'm neither a "worker" nor a slave, doing someone elses bidding, or at least if I can help it, and 2) because it sounds too much like that "biology is all little machines" creationist propaganda. The first point is dismissal of the arguement, and the second point is simply a feeling.
You may not be, but a hell of alot of people aspire to be.
When you're working in a dull, dead end job for 9 hours a day, where only basic motor functions are needed, you switch off and desire to switch off, because to do anything else brings you back to the mind numbing reality of what you are doing. Then, when you get home, you need the habit of something else to take up your time and help you forget. So you turn to TV and alcohol.
And the more you "live for the weekend" as so many people in such jobs do, the more you are just trying to blot out the meaningless of what you do to...well, survive, as this is hardly living.
Also, remember RAW (PBUH) and his "robot" spiel in Illuminatus!
The imprinted and conditioned domesticated primate brain plays out it's little programs in a predictable, robotic manner. Cf: The Machine,Ñ¢.
Quote from: Cain on January 25, 2007, 12:09:01 AM
Quote from: Buddhist_Monk_Wannabe on January 24, 2007, 10:52:46 PM
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 24, 2007, 08:56:24 PM
Quote from: Buddhist_Monk_Wannabe on January 24, 2007, 02:45:41 PM
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 23, 2007, 10:58:42 PM
Everyone is a robot, it's just up to us to decide how clever and enjoyable we are.
I dissagree.
On grounds of defnitions, I suspect. What parts do you disagree with and why, or else I can't really defend it.
On the grounds that 1) I am a human and I'm neither a "worker" nor a slave, doing someone elses bidding, or at least if I can help it, and 2) because it sounds too much like that "biology is all little machines" creationist propaganda. The first point is dismissal of the arguement, and the second point is simply a feeling.
You may not be, but a hell of alot of people aspire to be.
When you're working in a dull, dead end job for 9 hours a day, where only basic motor functions are needed, you switch off and desire to switch off, because to do anything else brings you back to the mind numbing reality of what you are doing. Then, when you get home, you need the habit of something else to take up your time and help you forget. So you turn to TV and alcohol.
And the more you "live for the weekend" as so many people in such jobs do, the more you are just trying to blot out the meaningless of what you do to...well, survive, as this is hardly living.
The biggests problem I had was with the word "everyone".
I was not dissagreeing that the actions and aspirations of a large portion of humanity tended in that direction.
Bah, what I meant is obvious and I won't word everything I say to syntactic perfection for the benefit of pedantic nitpickery.
You oughtta be used to it by now, tho, d00d.
I think I understand where BMW is coming from, and I tend to agree with him. I know you don't like nitpickery but perhaps the better word to use is "robotic", adjective, as opposed to "robot", noun. It may seem nitpickey, but really, there are two different meanings there.
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on January 25, 2007, 07:25:24 PM
I think I understand where BMW is coming from, and I tend to agree with him. I know you don't like nitpickery but perhaps the better word to use is "robotic", adjective, as opposed to "robot", noun. It may seem nitpickey, but really, there are two different meanings there.
And meaning is everything when it comes to comunication.
Quote from: Buddhist_Monk_Wannabe on January 25, 2007, 09:27:42 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on January 25, 2007, 07:25:24 PM
I think I understand where BMW is coming from, and I tend to agree with him.  I know you don't like nitpickery but perhaps the better word to use is "robotic", adjective, as opposed to "robot", noun.  It may seem nitpickey, but really, there are two different meanings there. 
And meaning is important when it comes to comunication.
fix - words help too
So does this mean you can have communication without meaning?
And yes, I have heard the term "meaningless conversation" before but let's be honest, what that really means is that it was a conversation in which one participant had no interest. There is still meaning conveyed, just not a meaning that one participant finds relevant or important to them. In any case what would an example of meaningless communication be?
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on January 26, 2007, 03:21:48 PM
So does this mean you can have communication without meaning?
And yes, I have heard the term "meaningless conversation" before but let's be honest, what that really means is that it was a conversation in which one participant had no interest. There is still meaning conveyed, just not a meaning that one participant finds relevant or important to them. In any case what would an example of meaningless communication be?
At least 3/4 of the shit I come away with, I would imagine.
To play the social angle, communication IS meaning, always, even if you don't mean anything.
Felix has the right answer here.
Sorry folks, but every utterance you utter, every meaningless glance you give off...has meaning. The linguist in me will have it no other way...
Isn't there a lot of room for interpretation, though?
I mean, you can shrug, and think you're saying, "my bad".
But someone can interpret it as you saying, "go fuck yourself".
Meaning is inexorably separate from interpretation. Symantic is an oft-useful refinement of expression, but I find it cumbersome.
Quote from: Jenne on January 26, 2007, 07:43:02 PM
Felix has the right answer here.
Sorry folks, but every utterance you utter, every meaningless glance you give off...has meaning.  The linguist in me will have it no other way...
Tourettes.
Just saying.
In that case, a Tourette's person's outbursts are there to say, "I have tourette's -FUCK... syndome, BITCH!"
Ah. Fuckin Gotcha, whore.
Confusticated again. :lol:
Nope, I knew that one.
Worth a shot.
Like I was saying though, everything we do down to body language has an interpretive value. Nothing is nothing, in human interaction.
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 26, 2007, 08:25:12 PM
Worth a shot.
Like I was saying though, everything we do down to body language has an interpretive value. Nothing is nothing, in human interaction.
In fact, it seems body language and tone outweigh content. Which makes the web fascinating as it may be the first mass medium based on content alone.
Well, except for trans-continental correspondence, back in the old days when people wrote "letters".
Letters were between two people. You didnt have 100 people all putting their own opinion to letters and passing them back and forth between the group.
Point taken.
Scientific research peer-review journals?
Maybe , but hardly on the same level or speed.
I'd suggest op-eds but usually if it's a well known writer (eg. George Will) their known political persuasions can color what they say whether it's intentional or not.
Most of the best conversations I've ever been involved in happened on the internets. Conversation is an artform. The art of conversation. Online is the difference between scribbling stick animals on the wall of a cave and the sistine chapel ceiling. Both have their place. One has had it's day.
Quote from: LMNO on January 26, 2007, 08:36:48 PM
Well, except for trans-continental correspondence, back in the old days when people wrote "letters".
Wait, those were like emails, except on paper, right?
Historians are largely agreed that it is likely, and etymology has made the claim that this is where we got the word mail. Wierd I know, but you can't make this stuff up.
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 26, 2007, 08:14:23 PM
Meaning is inexorably separate from interpretation. Symantic is an oft-useful refinement of expression, but I find it cumbersome.
qfmft
Quote from: LMNO on January 26, 2007, 08:36:48 PM
Well, except for trans-continental correspondence, back in the old days when people wrote "letters".
As well as these metatextual clues that are imbedded in this form of discourse known as punctuation, smilies and emoticons.
CAPS BECOME SHOUTING!!!!!
Excessive, usage, of commas...and dots...draw out...the speech...
as
does
the
return key.
Not to mention :) and :D...who can give a twist to what the average speech pattern on the screen says. So, for example,
You're a whore :D
can be taken quite different from
You're a whore.
And then there are things like *shrug* or *soft smile* where people imbed their mood or their tone with a supposed physical attitude or action. *glances furtively*
Without voices, we have created contextual cues to make our speech clearer.
Fascinating shit, this. I only studied it briefly, but I could expound on and read about it forever and a day, I think.
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on January 26, 2007, 08:53:58 PM
I'd suggest op-eds but usually if it's a well known writer (eg. George Will) their known political persuasions can color what they say whether it's intentional or not.
Yeah, and it takes a large amount of published and notorious discourse produced by said writer for that to take place. The fact that this can happen in so short a time so that people are judging what someone writes AS HE IS WRITING IT is a phenomenal thing.
Simply incredible.
Quote from: Jenne on January 27, 2007, 03:45:40 AM
Quote from: LMNO on January 26, 2007, 08:36:48 PM
Well, except for trans-continental correspondence, back in the old days when people wrote "letters".
As well as these metatextual clues that are imbedded in this form of discourse known as punctuation, smilies and emoticons.
CAPS BECOME SHOUTING!!!!!
Excessive, usage, of commas...and dots...draw out...the speech...
as
does
the
return key.
Not to mention :) and :D...who can give a twist to what the average speech pattern on the screen says. So, for example,
You're a whore :D
can be taken quite different from
You're a whore.
And then there are things like *shrug* or *soft smile* where people imbed their mood or their tone with a supposed physical attitude or action. *glances furtively*
Without voices, we have created contextual cues to make our speech clearer.
Fascinating shit, this. I only studied it briefly, but I could expound on and read about it forever and a day, I think.
And thats the kind of stuff I was talking about when I said I wanted to study internet communities.
Quote from: Buddhist_Monk_Wannabe on January 25, 2007, 09:27:42 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on January 25, 2007, 07:25:24 PM
I think I understand where BMW is coming from, and I tend to agree with him.  I know you don't like nitpickery but perhaps the better word to use is "robotic", adjective, as opposed to "robot", noun.  It may seem nitpickey, but really, there are two different meanings there. 
And meaning is everything when it comes to comunication.
Speling is opshunul.
Quote from: LHX on January 27, 2007, 12:14:04 AM
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 26, 2007, 08:14:23 PM
Meaning is inexorably separate from interpretation.  Symantic is an oft-useful refinement of expression, but I find it cumbersome.
qfmft
meaning and interpretation cause eachother like those two snakes curling around eachother in a spiral/helix. also (referring to the quote from GEB reprinted in the Machine pamphlet) meaning can exist independent of medium and interpretation can exist independent of interpreter, for both are two sides of the same coin called
pattern.
Quote from: triple zero on January 27, 2007, 02:46:27 PM
Quote from: LHX on January 27, 2007, 12:14:04 AM
Quote from: Felix Mackay on January 26, 2007, 08:14:23 PM
Meaning is inexorably separate from interpretation. Symantic is an oft-useful refinement of expression, but I find it cumbersome.
qfmft
meaning and interpretation cause eachother like those two snakes curling around eachother in a spiral/helix. also (referring to the quote from GEB reprinted in the Machine pamphlet) meaning can exist independent of medium and interpretation can exist independent of interpreter, for both are two sides of the same coin called pattern.
even that statement can prolly be refined and noted that the REAL opposition of 'interpretation' is
motive or motivation
meaning may not depend on interpretation
but
meaning might be the interface or grounds on which
motivation behind a message meets the
interpretation of the message
the
meaning of a message may not have anything to do with the
motivation or the
interpretation"000 you are a nice guy"
you can see the 3 components there:
1. why would i say that?
2. how do you interpret it?
3. what is the
meaningthis may all seem abstract, but it can be made practical
very practical
i think Netaungrot and maybe some others would agree
Quote from: The Good Reverend Roger on January 27, 2007, 06:58:40 AM
Quote from: Buddhist_Monk_Wannabe on January 25, 2007, 09:27:42 PM
Quote from: Rev. What's-His-Name? on January 25, 2007, 07:25:24 PM
I think I understand where BMW is coming from, and I tend to agree with him. I know you don't like nitpickery but perhaps the better word to use is "robotic", adjective, as opposed to "robot", noun. It may seem nitpickey, but really, there are two different meanings there.
And meaning is everything when it comes to comunication.
Speling is opshunul.
Sorry. I suck at spelling.
Quote from: LHX on January 27, 2007, 05:00:58 PM
even that statement can prolly be refined and noted that the REAL opposition of 'interpretation' is motive or motivation
meaning may not depend on interpretation
but
meaning might be the interface or grounds on which motivation behind a message meets the interpretation of the message
the meaning of a message may not have anything to do with the motivation or the interpretation
"000 you are a nice guy"
you can see the 3 components there:
1. why would i say that?
2. how do you interpret it?
3. what is the meaning
this may all seem abstract, but it can be made practical
very practical
i think Netaungrot and maybe some others would agree
This is why net communications are more meaning-oriented than social interactions in person, except that in person you become part of a vast set of exchanges in speech, tone, inflection, pitch, timbre, tempo, grammar, syntax, body language, eye contact, interplay of ego-dynamic, hidden or dual-meanings;
There is SO much noise. In text,
Content Can Communicate Completely Cohesively
uhhh... Felix...
ummm...
your font is showing
Is this wrong?
im just saying - you might wanna tuck it in
Not really my style.
Quote from: LHX on January 27, 2007, 05:00:58 PMeven that statement can prolly be refined and noted that the REAL opposition of 'interpretation' is motive or motivation
meaning may not depend on interpretation
but
meaning might be the interface or grounds on which motivation behind a message meets the interpretation of the message
the meaning of a message may not have anything to do with the motivation or the interpretation
"000 you are a nice guy"
you can see the 3 components there:
1. why would i say that?
2. how do you interpret it?
3. what is the meaning
this may all seem abstract, but it can be made practical
very practical
i think Netaungrot and maybe some others would agree
what you say is spot on, except for that i would like to place "meaning" in the middle of things.
meaning = pattern = form
"meaning" is an inherent/emergent property of "pattern", so much in fact that i would almost go as far as to say they're equivalent.
"interpretation" is something done to a pattern by an outside interpreter/actor, and is therefore (to me) of secondary importance, it comes
after the fact, so to speak.
i think we could call "interpretation" the discovery of a pattern, and the situation where multiple interpreters have different interpretations of the same (physical) thing would be the discovery of multiple/different patterns in the same medium.
"motivation" is, i think, something that comes before the pattern. it is the force that urges a certain pattern.
(or, there is another interpretation, where "motivation" implies the inclination of somebody to interpret your messages in a certain way. this would simply translate to the preference of discovering one pattern over another)
ok so i've just been reading some qabalah again recently, and have only read so far as the first three sephiroth, but this stuff really resonates with that. so you'll have to excuse this short sidetrack: (though i'd like to get some SSOOKN approval on it)
meaning = pattern = form, this is obviously Binah (third sephirah).
before that you have motivation, force, the feeling of necessity to express something. this force would be/come from Chokmah (second sephirah), blowing like a fire through Binah which forms this energy into a pattern.
(before that is Kether which happens to be the qabalistic answer to Kenan's question "where did 1 come from?", and before that is the triple veil of negative existence, or triple zero, which happens to be my alias, though i didn't know that at first when i picked it)
(i have the idea that as "interpretation" comes after "form", so that might be the fourth sephirah but i didn't get to Chesed yet with my reading)
btw, i take the above back.
well not entirely back, but i will refute it for myself:
DNA is an example where this whole intrinsic meaning stuff goes haywire. On the one hand, the complete definition of a species (and the nature-part of the individual, even) is encoded in the sequence of A, C T and G's.
On the other hand, without the decoding mechanism, the interpreter, without living cells, without ribosomes, the amino-acids, the mRNA, and the whole everything around it, there is no possibility at all that you are ever going to build a human being if all you have is 3 billion ACTGs.
ok so i stole this line of reasoning from Goedel Escher Bach which i picked up to read again this evening:
let's say you're an alien civilisation, let's say they're made of silicon and breathe methane (to suggest something totally different yet chemically not too implausible). now they receive this CD-ROM with 3 billion basepairs (this would actually fit, actually) and because they're so smart, they figure out a way to read the CD-ROM. now they've got the information, but it's impossible to ever get the meaning out, since they have no way of figuring out from the data itself what an amino-acid looks like (for example). and even then, to recreate the conditions of the womb that allows the proteine binding stuff to kickstart. it's basically a bootstrapping problem.
while on the other hand, if you're a current day human, and you find the DNA of a dinosaur inside a mosquite in a piece of rock, you have at least a theoretical chance of recreating the dinosaur from this DNA, because you've got the decoding mechanisms all around you.
keyword here is context of course.
the answer is a paradox, because there's also evidence of the inherent meaning of a message having a provable effect, independent of context, well sort of.
i'm going to think of it. maybe the DNA thing is like a barstool. as in "in theory meaning can exist independent of context and/or observer, but in practice i'd like to see you TRY"
In regards to meaning, many dissertations have tried and failed, many a university collaborative paper has tried and failed, many professor has tried and failed to quantify what meaning truly is in all senses. So, at least in linguistics, we tend to take it discipline by discipline instead. Meaning encompasses truly too too much in order to define it simply so that all facets are understood. In fact, there are probably facets that are still unknown, for the history of language only goes as far as the records indicate, and there has been much lost through the ages.
In terms of intent, it is true that the intent of communication, the intent of the utterance, is a major force behind the communication itself. How it's being interpreted, however, can counterpoint that to the exclusion of the intent's origins, so that the intent is changed in real time, as the construct is uttered, received, and reacted upon.
This mode of communication, posting on an electronic bulletin board, is more static and so this last is not as dynamic as it would be as say in a person-to-person conversation where voice is used, or in a realtime chat room where you can type while the person reads and so on and so forth.
Email and chat forums are slower forms of communication, so they hold more rigidity to the language constructs. You can be dynamic, but it's less likely as the control over who reads the utterances and who will respond is lessened considerably. Not knowing who your specific audience is and how they will react is also a factor to consider.
Again...I can go on and on. I just wanted to point out, I guess, that meaning is not a simple thing to explain, for anyone. It has depth, history, future, and very real-time implications for communication. All interlocutors shape it, all discussions factor into it, both known and unknown.
It's relatively unquantifiable...
Quote from: Jenne on January 30, 2007, 02:54:41 AM
In regards to meaning, many dissertations have tried and failed, many a university collaborative paper has tried and failed, many professor has tried and failed to quantify what meaning truly is in all senses. So, at least in linguistics, we tend to take it discipline by discipline instead. Meaning encompasses truly too too much in order to define it simply so that all facets are understood. In fact, there are probably facets that are still unknown, for the history of language only goes as far as the records indicate, and there has been much lost through the ages.
In terms of intent, it is true that the intent of communication, the intent of the utterance, is a major force behind the communication itself. How it's being interpreted, however, can counterpoint that to the exclusion of the intent's origins, so that the intent is changed in real time, as the construct is uttered, received, and reacted upon.
This mode of communication, posting on an electronic bulletin board, is more static and so this last is not as dynamic as it would be as say in a person-to-person conversation where voice is used, or in a realtime chat room where you can type while the person reads and so on and so forth.
Email and chat forums are slower forms of communication, so they hold more rigidity to the language constructs. You can be dynamic, but it's less likely as the control over who reads the utterances and who will respond is lessened considerably. Not knowing who your specific audience is and how they will react is also a factor to consider.
Again...I can go on and on. I just wanted to point out, I guess, that meaning is not a simple thing to explain, for anyone. It has depth, history, future, and very real-time implications for communication. All interlocutors shape it, all discussions factor into it, both known and unknown.
It's relatively unquantifiable...
i think you have effectively contradicted yourself and defined that meaning
is known, but its a conclusion that 'research teams' dont want to come to
its a conversation ender
existentialists understood that
meaning isnt tough to explain
its etched into communication in a way that renders in undefinable
for a person to say that they 'know the meaning of something' would be the equivalent of talking in the first-person and the third-person at the same time
Quote from: triple zero on January 29, 2007, 09:42:16 PM
btw, i take the above back.
well not entirely back, but i will refute it for myself:
DNA is an example where this whole intrinsic meaning stuff goes haywire. On the one hand, the complete definition of a species (and the nature-part of the individual, even) is encoded in the sequence of A, C T and G's.
On the other hand, without the decoding mechanism, the interpreter, without living cells, without ribosomes, the amino-acids, the mRNA, and the whole everything around it, there is no possibility at all that you are ever going to build a human being if all you have is 3 billion ACTGs.
ok so i stole this line of reasoning from Goedel Escher Bach which i picked up to read again this evening:
let's say you're an alien civilisation, let's say they're made of silicon and breathe methane (to suggest something totally different yet chemically not too implausible). now they receive this CD-ROM with 3 billion basepairs (this would actually fit, actually) and because they're so smart, they figure out a way to read the CD-ROM. now they've got the information, but it's impossible to ever get the meaning out, since they have no way of figuring out from the data itself what an amino-acid looks like (for example). and even then, to recreate the conditions of the womb that allows the proteine binding stuff to kickstart. it's basically a bootstrapping problem.
while on the other hand, if you're a current day human, and you find the DNA of a dinosaur inside a mosquite in a piece of rock, you have at least a theoretical chance of recreating the dinosaur from this DNA, because you've got the decoding mechanisms all around you.
keyword here is context of course.
the answer is a paradox, because there's also evidence of the inherent meaning of a message having a provable effect, independent of context, well sort of.
i'm going to think of it. maybe the DNA thing is like a barstool. as in "in theory meaning can exist independent of context and/or observer, but in practice i'd like to see you TRY"
a blueprint or a map is not the same as 'meaning'
in a situation like you are describing, it seems that meaning would have something more to do with the fact that people try to create things and piece together puzzles than it would have something to do with the actual problem they are trying to solve or piece together
like this discussion - the meaning seems to be more along the lines of 'in 2007, people were trying to define what was going on'
there is a 3rd person perspective to this situation that gives it context
Quote from: LHX on January 30, 2007, 03:17:02 AM
Quote from: Jenne on January 30, 2007, 02:54:41 AM
In regards to meaning, many dissertations have tried and failed, many a university collaborative paper has tried and failed, many professor has tried and failed to quantify what meaning truly is in all senses. So, at least in linguistics, we tend to take it discipline by discipline instead. Meaning encompasses truly too too much in order to define it simply so that all facets are understood. In fact, there are probably facets that are still unknown, for the history of language only goes as far as the records indicate, and there has been much lost through the ages.
In terms of intent, it is true that the intent of communication, the intent of the utterance, is a major force behind the communication itself. How it's being interpreted, however, can counterpoint that to the exclusion of the intent's origins, so that the intent is changed in real time, as the construct is uttered, received, and reacted upon.
This mode of communication, posting on an electronic bulletin board, is more static and so this last is not as dynamic as it would be as say in a person-to-person conversation where voice is used, or in a realtime chat room where you can type while the person reads and so on and so forth.
Email and chat forums are slower forms of communication, so they hold more rigidity to the language constructs. You can be dynamic, but it's less likely as the control over who reads the utterances and who will respond is lessened considerably. Not knowing who your specific audience is and how they will react is also a factor to consider.
Again...I can go on and on. I just wanted to point out, I guess, that meaning is not a simple thing to explain, for anyone. It has depth, history, future, and very real-time implications for communication. All interlocutors shape it, all discussions factor into it, both known and unknown.
It's relatively unquantifiable...
i think you have effectively contradicted yourself and defined that meaning is known, but its a conclusion that 'research teams' dont want to come to
its a conversation ender
existentialists understood that
meaning isnt tough to explain
its etched into communication in a way that renders in undefinable
for a person to say that they 'know the meaning of something' would be the equivalent of talking in the first-person and the third-person at the same time
Nope.  Because I'm talking about people concretely acting on known data.  You're reaching into a universe of the virtually unknown and only guessable.  Data =/= what can be or could be...though those conclusions are often reached when you are analyzing them.  Either way, if that's all you have when you're studying a particular construct, then give it up and start over.
I'm not contradicting myself by saying it's virtually unknown for the sheer complication of it.  That just means that those who think they can pin it down succinctly enough are missing most of the picture.
Or just leaving it out.
at first glance, it really doesnt seem like it would be such a demanding undertaking
surprise!
That's what happens when you look at language with just a "glance." As the premium form of communication that ties all humanity together...it warrants a bit more.
But I get uppity about it, and I should apologize.
Meaning, context, intent...these aren't as subjective and vague as someone who first gets into this type of discovery might initially find. In fact, you can trace most of these back into experience, history and clues that are superimposed ONTO the conversation itself.
However, you can never be inside someone else's head and your own at the same time. Well, I guess you can claim to, but who's going to believe you?
I find alts to be quite fascinating because of these details, really. You have to create a new identity with a syntax, vocabulary, tone and meme base, and then carry it through.
> there is a 3rd person perspective to this situation that gives it context
well except in the case of the Goedel-sentence G, which talks about itself*, contains a representation of itself, and it is the inherent meaning of this representation which causes G to be paradoxical.
(and in this case, for a mathematical sentence to be a paradox or not, would be sort of along the same lines as a few billions of base-pairs encoding for either a frog or a human)
now, you could say that the context in this case is the mathematical language, because without that it would just be a (rather long) string of symbols.
except that from the start of the proof, the construction of G, one assertion is that we take an arbitrary mathematical language.
(* stating the mathematical equivalent of "G is false")
Jenne: thanks, got any quick pointers on this from a linguistics point of view?
I'll work on it when my mind isn't being split in 5 different directions by work, fucktardo brothers, and whatnot/wherefore. It's a good theorem...give me a bit of time (like by my next break!)...