[Wittrs] Re: Meaning, Intent and Reference (Parsing Fodor?)

  • From: "SWM" <SWMirsky@xxxxxxx>
  • To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • Date: Thu, 11 Feb 2010 03:55:08 -0000

--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "jrstern" <jrstern@...> wrote:

> --- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "SWM" <SWMirsky@> wrote:
> >
> > So what's the Fodor theory of meaning in a nutshell?

> <snip>
>
> The short version is that there must be a "language of thought",
> Wittgenstein to the contrary, and that the formal (aka computational)
> and semantic (aka conceptual) aspects of that language are a "dual
> aspect all the way down".
>

If I understand this right, he's arguing for something going on in brains that 
has a one-to-one relationship with the referents outside of brains and he is 
further saying that the languages we speak and think in and the meanings our 
thoughts embody are the flip side(?) of the causal events in brains, i.e., that 
there's a precise parallel of brain event with every meaning, every thought we 
think linguistically without which our thoughts would lack meaning (content)?


> I would not really want to endorse this as such, without some major
> revisions.  Fodor does NOT want to reduce the semantic to the "formal"
> (which I keep putting in quotes because Fodor says he does not really
> know what it means either, and I think his choice of terms is very
> misleading).  I *do* want to reduce the semantic, such as it is, to
> the computational (which is not just "formal" in any common sense of
> that term).


<snip>>

> Josh

As you know I think we are in agreement on that (if I understand you right) 
though it's not because I "want" to be but because I think that's the best 
account.

How does this Fodorian view (if I've got it right) sit with the account I gave 
earlier of meaning as connection in a complex web of conserved connections?

Note that I would not say that this is separate from a syntactical account and, 
indeed, I am of the opinion that it is what we sometimes calls "syntax" (though 
I really don't like THAT usage, preferring "algorithmic", say) that underlies 
the complex conectionist web I am alluding to.

SWM

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