atw: Re: Into Linguistic semantics. [SEC=UNCLASSIFIED]

> 
>       I'm with Don Watson -- it's time to get our language back.
> 
>       --Peter M

The advantage of English is its precision - it is overloaded with verbs and
so allows for clear communication of relationships without reference to
surrounding context (as compared, say, to reading Chinese, or even German).

This precision is costly and over time favours introduction of 'simpler'
words that can appear to be 'as good as' but can often reflect a lack in
precision. (consider the differences between two words often considered 'the
same' - ILL vs SICK. One is old English, the other is from the Danelaw times
but SICK is more often linked with some form of physical action, as in
vomiting where as ILL is less precise but covers the overall situation. From
a SYMMETRIC perspective, a vague communication, both are metaphors and are
interchangeable but the subtle precision difference comes out in : "X is
really ill, he was sick all over the floor" - as compared to "X is really
sick, he was ill all over the floor".

Overall, the issues come down to the difference/sameness dichotomy and
issues with self-referencing (and the notion of asymmetric vs symmetric
communication styles)

An example is of Chris and Peter standing on a street corner as someone
drives by. That someone can (a) see two men or (b) see Chris and Peter.

(a) reflects a bias to sameness (all counting numbers do that) whereas (b)
focuses on differences (unique labels).

For precision (b) is better but is also increasingly costlier the more
difference that is present (e.g. Chris, Peter, Bob, Terry on the corner vs
"four men" or "four of the gang" or "the gang" or "Chris and friends" etc.)

The symmetric perspective reflects a conservation of energy perspective, a
lack in precision and favouring 'superpositions' of meaning where the reader
has to 'fill in the dots' or more so extract the particulars from the
general terms. This can be useful when communicating to a group with
different personal biases in representing things (e.g. one person is visual
and prefers predicates covering vision, another may be auditory biased,
another tactile biased) but precision may DEMAND a vision-based perspective
(e.g. describing some use of a visual display etc and so forcing the reader
to access vision at all times regardless of their preference)

A property of deriving algorithms/formulas for use in communication is that
the sameness focus encourages a general laxity in communication, a loss of
syntax for semantics, the precision of difference for the ease and
familiarity, and energy conservation, with sameness. The only problem is
that as a species we habituate to sameness!

This loss of precision favours an increase in the use of rich metaphor and a
focus on symmetric forms of communication (where the translation of
difference to sameness is best performed, when demanding quick assessments,
through the use of symmetry and so metaphor. The problem with symmetric
communications is it is VAGUE and allows for replacement of one form of
communication with any other since all forms are metaphors and so
interchangeable. Our primate instincts favour (a) sensitivity to difference
and then (b) identification of sameness within that difference - and so an
attempt to make the asymmetric (difference) symmetric (same) -
instincts/habits do this since their foundations are in mapping sameness)

In the context of TECHNICAL technical writing, the attraction to
algorithm/formula and so a symmetric format may be tempting but the issue is
in the need for precision -  this is not story telling where I encourage the
reader to let fly with their imagination as they read the prose; the
material must be clear and will assume a certain level of expertise in the
readers such that words of more than two syllables are permissible; jargon
is permissible, in fact encouraged in that familiarity with the jargon means
familiarity with the specialist perspective and its associated lexicon (and
it makes the newbies ASK QUESTIONS and so get quickly entangled with the
specialisation - bond with it as such and in so doing introduce a sense of
difference to one's identity!)

In the development of our brains, as social animals there is an original
bias to symmetric dynamics - sameness rules. We see this even in basic
mathematics where the counting numbers are all about symmetry and reflect
symmetric laws (commutative, associative, distributive laws).

With the introduction of imaginary numbers comes the recognition of
sequencing of sameness in the form of cycles etc. THEN we move into areas
where the symmetry breaks down (quaternions, octonions etc) and we move more
and more into high precision where semantics is compressed into syntax - all
that is meaningful is 'correct' position in some hierarchy.

These differences coming out of sameness reflect the styles of writing for
audiences - Business analysts are more symmetric in thinking than systems
programmers where asymmetric understanding is vital.

Overall we have a development of (a) magnitudes focus (cardinality, scalars,
emotional expressions, and then (b) sequencing focus (ordinality, vectors,
emotion is compressed into the feelings of syntax, 'correct' or 'incorrect'.
And finally (c) hierarchy where the symmetric and asymmetric are combined
into the anti-symmetric, different forms of hierarchy mixing magnitude and
sequence and reflecting context sensitivities in the form of nested vs
non-nested hierarchies where the former is energy conserving and allowing
for dependencies across levels whereas the latter is energy expending and so
each level is semi-autonomous from the others (this is the 'traditional'
pyramid form of hierarchy).

Given all of the above, the technical writer position covers a bias to
sequencing over magnitudes, logic over emotional logic (the latter called
bi-logic in that it is symmetric and so fails to recognise the asymmetric
logic operators (IMP) where it will try and make such an operator symmetric
(XOR is the symmetric representative of difference as compared to the EQV
operator that is the symmetric representative of sameness) and so the
elements of a dichotomy are interchangeable as are the use of different
metaphors to understand something - all part of the metaphorcation process
that DEMANDS symmetric perspectives as it translates difference into
sameness.

Given the issue of habituation to sameness, it can be useful to introduce a
term that 'jars' a reading and so can 'wake up' the reader ;-) - or a turn
of phrase that is so different that it makes a difference in the overall
comprehension of what is being read. Difficulties come if the difference is
too different, the reader has to struggle to link the difference with what
they know and so sameness (where such an act is instinctive overall, we seek
to convert difference to sameness through metaphors etc and so seek to ease
such a path or else make it difficult by bringing out some unique aspect
that should not be integrated with other material, it should be in its own
context)

The English language focus on precision is on the production of labels, and
so mapping differences as differences rather than compressing them into some
single form that is then only understood when in the correct context (which
gets us into the particle/wave dichotomy - but that's another story (derived
from the metaphor that is quantum mechanics ;-))


Chris
-----------------------------
generic categories of meaning:
------------------------------
Objects bias (differentiating):
BLEND - wholeness, whole numbers
BOUND - partness, rational numbers
Relationships bias (integrating):
BOND - share space, irrational numbers
BIND - share time, imaginary numbers

From these come composites as reals, complex, quaternions, octonions. All
else follows....
http://members.iimetro.com.au/~lofting/myweb/introIDM.html


**************************************************
To post a message to austechwriter, send the message to 
austechwriter@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

To subscribe to austechwriter, send a message to 
austechwriter-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with "subscribe" in the Subject field.

To unsubscribe, send a message to austechwriter-request@xxxxxxxxxxxxx with 
"unsubscribe" in the Subject field.

To search the austechwriter archives, go to 
www.freelists.org/archives/austechwriter

To contact the list administrator, send a message to 
austechwriter-admins@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
**************************************************

Other related posts: