Download - (3) the scope of semantics 1
![Page 1: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/1.jpg)
THE SCOPE OF SEMANTICS
(1)
![Page 2: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/2.jpg)
In the coming chapters
We need to consider various aspects of
semantics.To do this, the way has to
be cleared by
![Page 3: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/3.jpg)
(1) Discussing (and dismissing) two
unsatisfactory views of semantics.
WHY
They provide no solution to semantic
problems.
![Page 4: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/4.jpg)
Note: These two views may
seem at first plausible, but they
are really not.
![Page 5: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/5.jpg)
(2) Attempting to set out some of the more
important distinctions that have to be made.
![Page 6: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/6.jpg)
![Page 7: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/7.jpg)
Naming Language is a communication
system.The concept of the signifier and the
signified is central to that system.
BUTThere is a basic problem here
![Page 8: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/8.jpg)
![Page 9: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/9.jpg)
An ancient view comes from Plato
![Page 10: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/10.jpg)
1. The signifier is a word in the language.2. The signified is an object in the world.3. The signifier:
stands forrefers todenotes
the signified.(Words are names or lables for things)
![Page 11: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/11.jpg)
Taken at face value:No doubt this is true. Children learn any of their
words by naming things.
BUT
![Page 12: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/12.jpg)
There are problems:
What part of speech is this view more likely
to apply to?
NOUNS
![Page 13: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/13.jpg)
How do grammarians define nouns?
![Page 14: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/14.jpg)
Word that names
•A Person
An Idea
A Thing
A Place
![Page 15: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/15.jpg)
Names of things, people, places
and concepts
![Page 16: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/16.jpg)
What about other parts of speech?
Adjectives: Take colours as an example:
![Page 17: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/17.jpg)
![Page 18: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/18.jpg)
Colours are names.
Colours can be adjectives.
What is your favourite colour?Do you dram in colour?green bananas
![Page 19: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/19.jpg)
With reference to the relationship between “the
signifier” and “the signified ”
What about other adjectives?
![Page 20: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/20.jpg)
Can they be used as a label to identify
something that they denote?
![Page 21: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/21.jpg)
Take the examples of: fearful,
interesting, clever
(in a clever idea)
![Page 22: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/22.jpg)
What about verbs?Is it possible to identify what is
'named' by a verb?
![Page 23: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/23.jpg)
With nouns we can often draw a picture of the object that is denoted.
A boy
![Page 24: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/24.jpg)
BUT What about a verb like ‘run’?
![Page 25: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/25.jpg)
We can attempt to illustrate what it
denotes with a picture of a boy running
![Page 26: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/26.jpg)
![Page 27: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/27.jpg)
There are two difficulties that arise:
1. We are not presented separately with a boy and with 'running'.
We need a fairly sophisticated method of separating the two.
![Page 28: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/28.jpg)
2. We can distinguish the boy and 'what he is doing‘.
![Page 29: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/29.jpg)
The boy
What he is doing
![Page 30: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/30.jpg)
But it is far more difficult to identify precisely what are the essential characteristics of what is denoted by the verb than what is denoted by the noun.
![Page 31: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/31.jpg)
Does running involve only the movement of the feet or are the arms involved too?
Does it necessarily involve a change of position?
Is the speed relevant?
![Page 32: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/32.jpg)
Clearly there is not something that can easily be recognised and identified as 'running'
![Page 33: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/33.jpg)
This is ‘run’. What about:
remember like see
![Page 34: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/34.jpg)
What about the other “parts of
speech”
![Page 35: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/35.jpg)
prepositions
conjunctions
pronounsEtc.
![Page 36: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/36.jpg)
What about nouns such as:
If we hold the theory of ‘naming’ true, can it be applied only to
nouns?
![Page 37: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/37.jpg)
unicorn
![Page 38: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/38.jpg)
ghost
![Page 39: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/39.jpg)
fairy
![Page 40: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/40.jpg)
gremlin
![Page 41: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/41.jpg)
Do they denote objects in the world?
Can we distinguish two kinds of world:
the ‘real world’ and the ‘other world’?
What will happen if we do?
![Page 42: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/42.jpg)
We must admit that words are not just names of things, and it must involve some fairly sophisticated explanation of the way in which we can move from giving names to objects in the world to giving
names to objects that do not exist
![Page 43: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/43.jpg)
What about
•The digital world?
![Page 44: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/44.jpg)
What about
Virtual reality?
![Page 45: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/45.jpg)
What about
Cyberspace?
![Page 46: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/46.jpg)
Forget about the ‘other world’.
Aren’t there nouns that do not refer to
imaginary things but do not refer to physical
objects at all?
![Page 47: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/47.jpg)
Can we identify the object to be named by:
lovehateinspiration
![Page 48: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/48.jpg)
•What do grammarians call such words?• “abstract things’’•Why do they call them
things?•Because they have nouns
corresponding to them.
![Page 49: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/49.jpg)
We fall in a trap of a circular definition:
Nouns refer to things.
Things are named by nouns.
![Page 50: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/50.jpg)
Another problem:• Even with some
identifiable physical objects, the meaning is not
the same with its denotation:
![Page 51: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/51.jpg)
Morning starEvening star
![Page 52: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/52.jpg)
![Page 53: (3) the scope of semantics 1](https://reader033.vdocument.in/reader033/viewer/2022061210/5490af18b47959362c8b45e7/html5/thumbnails/53.jpg)
Another difficulty: Visible objects in the world around us often
seem to denote a whole set of rather different
objects.