January 24, 2009
Linguisic Anarchy!
I'm one of those people who can often get over an inability to settle down to work by going out to a cafe. Since I'm in Berkeley now, naturally the cafe I found this afternoon was no ordinary Seattle's Best, but the Mediterraneum Caffé (Caffé Med) on Telegraph, former haunt of Ginsberg and other Beats, and the place that claims to have invented the latte.
I asked for a small latte. The young server paused and said, "would a medium be ok?" I said ``er, sure..." and she said "because technically if it's in a cup smaller than this one (holding up a cup that would make a perfectly respectable soup bowl) then it's not called a latte. Actually, if it's like a latte but in this cup (holding up a cup that is still generous for a coffee cup) it's called a macchiato."
Having been influenced by old Language Log posts on Starbucks' (you don't say small you say tall) and Microsoft's (Microsoft has no genitive) amateurish attempts to regiment language in various ways, I'm never very impressed by this sort of thing. It's not that I'm opposed to the regimentation of language in general---in fact, I usually follow one of my old teachers in recommending that my logic students refrain from using valid in informal senses (valid point of view, valid claim etc.) and reserve the word for it's technical senses (which are tricky enough as it is, given that many books reserve one technical use of the word for first order logical truths, as well as allowing the more well-known use on which it is a property of arguments or argument schemata in general.) So anyway, that sentence got away from me. It's not that I'm opposed to the regimentation of language in general, but just that I reject the authority of just about everyone in imposing it, including Starbucks, but also including funky historical local coffee shops.
So what's the difference between what they're doing, and what I feel justified in doing in my classes? Well, I think it's just that I have a good justification for the regimentation. Reserving valid for the technical uses aids communication and understanding of the subject at hand. A regimentation that makes it impossible to request a coffee like a medium latte, but smaller, by saying "small latte'' does not. In fact, it seems like a snobbish attempt to wield power for the sake of it. Similarly for the Microsoft and Starbucks examples.
Am I right? I can imagine someone defending the Starbucks example by claiming that the justification for having special names for their coffee sizes is artistic. They want their customers to have the best, most enjoyable most interesting/mysterious/exotic coffee-drinking experience possible, and what better justification could there be for their decision to name their sizes as they have?
But even if that is so, it could only justify their introduction of the new expressions, not the outlawing of the old---and hence not the regimentation.
Anyway, though I wasn't impressed by the no-such-thing-as-a-small-latte claim, neither am I impressed by people who are rude to young service workers, so I tried to make conversation, dredging up some faint memories about what a macchiato actually was: "That's interesting. I thought a macchiato was where you just marked the expresso with foam?" "Oh no,'' she said, "a machiatto is just like a latte but with less milk." And I just shut up and smiled and handed over my 4 bucks.
Maybe Berkeley cafes are going to be more distracting than the ones in St Louis.
Posted by logican at 05:44 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
February 27, 2007
JC's Column
I spent some time in the departure lounge of Calgary airport on Friday, with Agustin "the Mexican Multiplier" Rayo and JC Beall, and JC mentioned how annoying he found it that some philosophers used the expressions "philosophical logic" and "philosophy of logic" interchangably. In fact, he thought he might write something up about it and try to get people to take notice. Not being one to stomp on a worthy cause, I asked him whether he'd let me post such a thing to a blog. He agreed, and so I give you JC's Column (an occasional series?) Reform or perish...
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Terminological Theme: Philosophical Logic, Philosophy of Logic, and Formal Philosophy.
There's reason to think that confusion exists over the terminology of "philosophical logic" and "philosophy of logic". It would do the profession -- and, perhaps, aspiring graduate students -- well to have uniform terminology. While terminological differences certainly exist across the English-speaking countries (e.g., in parts of the UK, "philosophical logic" is often synonymous with "philosophy of logic", though not so in Oz), here is a fairly standard -- though admittedly (perhaps perforce) vague -- classification, one that, if broadly adopted, would at least diminish some of the confusion.
A. Formal Philosophy: formal (mathematical) methods used in the service of philosophy.
(This comprises a lot, including philosophical logic, some areas of mathematical logic, decision theory, what Branden calls "formal epistemology", some areas of foundations of mathematics, some incarnations of philosophy of logic, some incarnations of philosophy of language, and much more. Similarly, some work in metaphysics -- particularly, formal ontology, formal mereology, etc. -- would certainly fall under this banner. So, this category is perhaps the broadest category, but it's worth including here. What is crucial is that formal, mathematical methods -- as opposed to just using symbols as abbreviations, etc. (!) -- is essential.)
B. Philosophical Logic: formal logic (usually, applied maths) in the service of philosophy; in particular, a formal account of *consequence* for some philosophically interesting fragment of discourse.
[If we take Logic to be concerned with *consequence*, then philosophical logic aims to specify -- in a formal, precise way -- the consequence relation over some philosophically significant fragment of our language. (Usually, this is done by constructing a formal "model language", and proposing that the logic of the target "real language" is relevantly like *that*.) Usually, philosophical logic overlaps a lot with formal semantics, but may often be motivated more by philosophical concerns than by linguistic data. Work on formal truth theories -- i.e., specifying the logic of truth -- is a familiar example of work in philosophical logic, as are the familiar modal and many-valued accounts of various expressions, and similarly concerns about 'absolute generality' and the *consequence* relation governing such quantification, and much, much else. What is essential, as above, is a specification of a given *consequence* relation for the target, philosophically interesting phenomenon. Whether the consequence relation is specified "semantically", via models, or proof-theoretically is not critical -- although the former might often prove to be heuristically better in philosophy.]
C. Philosophy of Logic: philosophy motivated by Logic; philosophical issues arising out of a given, specified logic (or family of logics).
[While competence in (formal) logic is often a prerequisite of good philosophy of logic, no formal logic or, for that matter, formal methods need be involved in doing philosophy of logic. Of course, philosophy of logic often overlaps with philosophy of language -- as with many areas of philosophy. The point is that philosophy of logic, while its target *may* be mathematical or formal, needn't be an instance of either philosophical logic -- which essentially involves formal methods -- or, more broadly, formal methods. A lot of work on "nature of truth" might be classified as philosophy of logic (though much of it probably isn't motivated by logic, and so shouldn't be so classified), and similarly for "nature of worlds" etc. Whether the classification is appropriate depends, in part, on the given project -- e.g., whether, as with Quine and Lewis, one is directly examining the commitments of a particular logical theory, as opposed to merely reflecting on "intuitions" concerning notions that are often thought to be logically significant. The point, again, is just that philosophy of logic is a distinct enterprise from philosophical logic, each requiring very different areas of competence, and each targeted at different aims.]
It would be useful if the profession, in general, but especially *practitioners* adopted terminology along the above lines. Of course, there's still room for confusion, and the foregoing hardly cuts precise joints. It might be useful to discuss refinements to the above terminological constraints.
One more -- just for those who might be wondering:
D. Mathematical Logic: formal logic in the service of (usually classical!) mathematics, as well various subfields of mathematics. (E.g., standard limitative theorems and classical metatheory is mathematical logic, as is reverse mathematics, many aspects of category theory, many aspects of set theory, areas of abstract algebra, areas of recursion theory, and so on. Mathematicians need have no interest in philosophy to engage in such areas, in contrast with the philosophical logician who is driven to use "mathematical methods" in an effort to clarify the consequence relation of some philosophically interesting "discourse". There's more to be said here, but this is chiefly a post about A, B, and C.)
** One note: it may well be that anyone talented in B is interested in C, but it hardly follows that one who is talented in B is talented in C. Similarly, one who is talented in C may well have little talent or interest in B. My hunch is that, on the whole, those who do B (or do it well) are usually talented in C. It's unclear whether those with a talent in D are naturals for B or C -- or A, for that matter -- but one can think of excellent philosophers who also engaged directly in D. (The obvious such folks were also good at A, B, and C, as well as D. Russell comes to mind, as does Kripke, but there are others.)
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Posted by logican at 03:16 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
February 27, 2006
Camillus, Caeso, Volesus
Expressions that were once current have gone out of use nowadays. Names, too, that were formally household words are virtually archaisms today; Camillus, Caeso, Volesus, Dentatus; or a little later, Scipio and Cato; Augustus too, and even Hadrian and Antoninus. All things fade into the storied past, and in a little while are shrouded in oblivion. (section 33, book 4 of the Meditations)
Marcus Aurelius does a little socio-linguistics. (For more recent analysis see chapter 6 of Freakonomics
Posted by logican at 11:15 AM | Comments (3) | TrackBack
February 09, 2006
Name Systems
In section IV of "On Referring" Strawson remarks that although names for people are usually arbitrary it "would be perfectly possible to have a thorough-going system of names, based e.g. on dates of birth, or on a minute classification of physiological and anatomical differences."
It seems to me that there's a reasonable case to be made that we already have such systems. There's the system we use for constructing names for the natural and rational numbers, and for some of the reals, there's a system for naming dates (e.g. "January 9th 1942"). I wonder if there's a system for naming stars? (The International Star Registry, which lets you pay to name a star after your hamster, doesn't count.) And I wonder if the expressions determined by such systems really count as names, and at what point we slip into the realm of descriptions.
Posted by logican at 12:28 AM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
September 13, 2005
Cute Fact of the Day
"In the original German, the last and culminating tantalising-mystical proposition [of Wittgenstein's Tractatus] can, as is well-known, be sung to the tune of Good King Wenceslas. Wovon man nicht sprechen kann, darüber muss man schweigen." (p.10 of Gellner's Words and Things)
This is good news, as the original lyrics cannot.
UPDATE 17.22, 13/9/05: Everyone's reading this book. No wait, every Kieran is reading this book.
Posted by logican at 03:44 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack
September 11, 2005
Toscar on Titan
Twin Earth for real?
"Titan is perhaps the most Earth-like place in the Solar System other than Earth, in terms of the balance of processes," says Jonathan Lunine, of the University of Arizona, who is an interdisciplinary scientist for Cassini-Huygens.
"Wind-driven processes, river channels, evidence of rain, possible lakes and geological features that may have to do with volcanism and tectonism."
But the chemistry that drives these processes is radically different between the two worlds. For example, methane seems to perform many of the same roles on Titan that water plays on Earth.
Posted by logican at 02:41 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 22, 2005
Indexicals in the Wilder
Now that I'm paying attention, I'm noticing odd or playful uses of indexicals all over the place. Here's one from the programme of the Edmonton Fringe Festival:
Magic. Mirth. Monkeys. Dave Cox is hilarious. And I'm not just saying that because I'm his hastily thrown together program blurb. He's very, very funny. More than that, he'll fool the pants of you. And then he'll politely give them back, unlike some of those weaselly trouser stealing magicians I'm sure you've heard so much about.
For a second I wondered if this was an example in which 'I' fails to refer to the agent of the context, and refers instead to the text itself. But actually, I think the conceit is that the text is the agent of the context - it's as if the text itself is speaking to us.
Perhaps I should take a leaf out of Mr Cox' book next time I write the blurb for one of my courses...
Posted by logican at 11:30 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
August 17, 2005
Indexicals in the Wild
This morning I noticed an interesting use of "I" in an email from Amnesty:
There isn't much I can add to the details shared here. I was horribly beaten and abused. Police. Hospitals. Restraining orders. Leaving and returning. Fear (of him) and loathing (of myself). I am your wife, sister, mother, daughter, niece and neighbor. I am the same story told in a different voice hundreds of thousands of times.
I doubt Amnesty sent this to me so that I can comment on the language, so if you want to know more you can check out the site here.
But what's interesting about the use of "I" in "I am your wife, sister, mother, daughter, niece and neighbor" is that i) this seems like a legitimate use of language and ii) it is plausible that the sentence is analytically false, since, for example, no-one can be both your mother and your daughter. (Putting worries about time travel aside for now.)
If this is right, then it seems to mitigate the damage done by answer-machine examples ("I'm not here right now, please leave a message") to theories of indexicals on which the sentence 'I am here now' comes out as analytic. It's just not that unusual for us to say things that are, not only false, but, analytically false - false in virtue of what they mean and transparently so.
Posted by logican at 12:35 PM | Comments (5) | TrackBack
April 07, 2005
Officialese
It's US tax filing time, which means that it is time for my annual confrontation with the bizarre question 12 on form 8843 [88kb pdf]:
Were you present in the United States as a teacher, trainee or student for any part of more than 5 calendar years?
Take ANY period of time shorter than 5 years. Say, 20 minutes during 2004. That is a part of the 10 year block between 1996 and 2006, which is more than 5 calendar years. So it looks to me as if, if I have ever been to the US at all (as a teacher, trainee or student), I should answer 'yes' to that question.
But this cannot be what they really mean, otherwise they would have asked "have you ever been present in the United States as a teacher, trainee or student?" And even we aliens know that it is best not to upset the IRS. So I have to figure out what they meant to ask. And it is kind of difficult to express, which is probably why it turned out so badly on the form. But I think it is this:
Have there been 6 or more calendar years in which you were present in the United States as a teacher, trainee or student for part of the year?
Not elegant, perhaps, but at least it asks the right question.
Posted by logican at 02:40 PM | Comments (0) | TrackBack
March 06, 2005
Funakoshi and Language Change
Philosophers of language often think of language in very abstract, idealised ways, and so it can be useful for us to have a stock of stories about language "in the wild" to keep our feet on the ground. (Gareth Evans' Madagascar story seems like a good example of this; it makes us much more careful about how we formulate the causal theory of reference.) So here is a real-world story about language change:
In his autobiography, Gichin Funakoshi (1868-1957), the founder of shotokan karate, reports on a controversy over the interpretation of the expression 'karate.' First he tells us how the controversy arose:
The Japanese language is not an easy one to master, nor is it always quite so explicit as it might be: different characters may have exactly the same pronunciations, depending upon the use. The expression 'karate' is an excellent example. 'Te' is easy enough, it means 'hand(s).' But there are two quite different characters that are both pronounced kara; one means 'empty,' and the other is the Chinese character referring to the Tang dynasty and may be translated 'Chinese.' [...] So should our martial art be written with the characters that mean 'empty hand(s)' or with those that mean "Chinese hand(s)"?
It turns out that a case can be made for both these interpretations. Funakoshi relates that before he moved from Okinawa to Tokyo in the 1920's:
it was customary to use the character for 'Chinese' rather than that for 'empty' to write 'karate'
But anyone who has seen The Karate Kid might recall that Daniel's sensei, Mr Miyagi, explains the meaning of 'karate' as empty hand, and indeed, when I was a kid, everyone (that is, everyone under 4 feet tall,) knew that 'karate' meant 'empty hand(s).' So how did we get from the predominant 'Chinese' interpretation on Okinawa, to 'empty' in popular Western culture?
Answer: Funakoshi found 'empty' more appropriate (Chinese boxing is very different from karate, karate is the art of fighting without weapons (with empty hands) and he appreciated the connection with the Buddhist doctrine of emptiness) and he simply decided to start writing it that way.
My suggestion initially illicited violent outbursts of criticism in both Toyko and Okinawa, but I have confidence in the change and have adhered to it over the years. Since then, it has in fact gained such wide acceptance that the word 'karate' would look strange to all of us now if it were written with the Chinese 'kara' character.
Funakoshi then goes on standardise the names of shotokan kata, but finishes the section modestly:
I have no doubt whatsoever that in the future, as times change, again and then again, the kata will be given new names. And that, indeed, is as it should be.
I think part of the reason that Funakoshi was successful in establishing the 'empty hand(s)' interpretation was the social deference offered him by the small linguistic community that is comprised of karate-ka worldwide. Hollywood probably deferred to them, and all the under-four-feet-tall humans of my acquantence deferred to Hollywood.
If everyone had ignored Funakoshi, the language would not have changed. So this seems to be a real-world example of deference as a mechanism of language change.
(I wonder what would have happened if Hollywood had made up an alternative interpretation of 'karate' from scratch?)