[lit-ideas] Re: Shall But Won't
- From: Omar Kusturica <omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Fri, 31 Oct 2014 16:49:14 +0100
The original Serbian is: "teći će rijeke krvi", but as we see, in this case
the ambiguity is perfectly translatable into English. (Or any other
language that has future tense, I suppose.)
True, there is no "I" in Šešelj's statement - he does not say "I shall make
rivers of blood flow" - but as he was a chief of a political party (which
was formally in opposition a the time, but close to the government policy
in some respects) and had some paramilitary troops under his control (at
least partially), there are reasons to think that he was in the position to
at least contribute to the outcome that he was ostensibly predicting.
O.K.
On Fri, Oct 31, 2014 at 2:04 AM, Redacted sender Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx for
DMARC <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> In a message dated 10/29/2014 9:52:39 A.M. Eastern Daylight Time,
> omarkusto@xxxxxxxxx writes:
> I wouldn't think that it is 'conversational implicature' since the
> ambiguity is semantic, i.e. future tense is often ambiguous that way. For
> example,
> a Serbian nationalist politician Vojislav Šešelj predicted in the
> beginning of the 1990s a civil war in which "rivers of blood, will flow."
> He now
> claims (on trial in the Hague) that it was a factual use of 'will'
> (prediction), while the prosecution argues that it was an intentional use
> (announcing plans or threatening). Okay, I'll not go on about this, the
> point is that
> the future tense is inherently ambiguous.
>
> This in connection with Brecht (check the original German in
> "Flüchtlingsgespräche"):
>
> "If you inspect my books,
> I shall not continue to be your finance minister." -- Finance Minister of
> Denmark.
>
> D. McEvoy quotes:
>
> >>Finance Minister is involved with, the 'future' that
> >>Grice calls 'intentional'.>
>
> and writes
>
> >Come now, everyone.
>
> The opposition can be between the future indicated or factual and the
> future intentional, or between 'shall' and 'will'.
>
> It strikes me that since we have two lexemes here ('shall' and 'will'),
> the point raised by Omar K. about 'will' being ambiguous is subtle and
> nice.
>
> It seems there may be a difference in three examples:
>
> i.
>
> If you inspect my books, I shall not continue to be your finance minister.
> --- vs. If you inspect my books, I will not continue to be your finance
> minister.
>
> Omar's example, citing from Vojislav Šešelj (check with original Serbian):
>
> ii.
>
> Rivers of blood will flow.
> ---- vs. Rivers of blood shall flow.
>
> and Grice's example, citing from God:
>
> iii.
> There will be light.
> ------ vs. There shall be light.
>
> "God might have uttered [There shall be light] while engaged in the
> Creation."
>
> Only (i) -- Brecht's example -- is in the _first person_ :
>
> "I will/shall not continue to be your finance minister".
>
> God's and Šešelj's examples are _not_ in the first person.
>
> The grammatical subject of Šešelj's utterance is 'rivers of flood'
> ['will' [to] flow']. The grammatical subject of God's utterance is 'Light'
> (Literally:
>
> Light will be _there_.
>
> In the three cases, we may, after R. M. Hare, refer to a 'phrastic', or
> dictum:
>
> -- The Finance Minister ceases his job.
> -- Light is there (or there is light).
> -- Rivers of flood flow.
>
> And in the three cases (although Šešelj may claim otherwise) the 'modal'
> element applies to the _utterer_.
>
> That is: either
>
> (a) FUTURE INDICATED or factual:
>
> the utterer merely (merely?) predicts that p (and is not committal as to
> desire but merely expresses the belief that 'p' will come to pass)
>
> or
>
> (b) FUTURE intentional:
>
> the utterer adds a conative (or desiderative) element to the effect that
> the utterer wishes p to be the case in the future -- hence the
> 'intentional'. It is the _utterer_'s intention that p.
>
> Part of the problem is indeed, as Omar K. notes, semantic.
>
> In "Meaning", Grice quotes only one author: C. L. Stevenson. Stevenson (in
> his then new book with Yale U. P., "Language and ethics") was concerned,
> as Grice was, reading Peirce, by this animistic or anthropomorphic use of
> 'mean' as in
>
> The barometer means that the humidity in the room is high.
>
> Surely the barometer doesn't have a 'mind', so the barometer cannot mean
> unless in scare quotes. Grice's example is similar:
>
> Those spots 'mean' measles (Actually, they don't mean anything to me, but
> they mean measles to the doctor).
>
> Grice encounters that one uses 'mean' followed by 'to', as in "He meant to
> have rivers of blood flowing"). This use is analogous to 'intends to'.
>
> In old Latin, the future tense was part of the declension. In Italian, as
> in the modern Languages (including modern English) the use of an auxiliary
> seems mandatory:
>
> 'will rise'.
>
> The sun will rise.
>
> But the sun does not have a will, so it cannot be the case that the sun
> will rise.
>
> Similarly, the sun will not set at 8 pm, since the sun, not having a soul,
> cannot 'will'.
>
> It is due to this confusion that the Serbian Šešelj's can say that
>
> there WILL be rivers of flood -- even when rivers seldom have a soul.
>
> Similarly, too, with God and his authoritative utterance, "Light will be
> there" (It's possibly different in Hebrew). Light has no will. It is
> _God_'s
> will, the will of the utterer of the claim that is thus transferred to the
> 'phrastic'.
>
> The point is discussed by Grice in connection with Hume's scepticism about
> 'cause'.
>
> As Hume noted, 'to cause' may well derive its meaning from 'to will' but it
> would be otiose, says Grice, to think that Charles I's decapitation willed
> his own death.
>
> Grice writes:
>
> "Alternatively, the paradox-propounder might agree that an ordinary
> expression, of the kind which he is assailing (e.g. "Decapitation was the
> cause
> of Charles I's death" would be used to describe such a situation as that
> actually obtaining at Charles I's death (i.e. it would be used to describe
> an
> ACTUAL situation and not merely an _impossible_ situation); but then he
> might add that the user of such an expression ['cause'] would not MERELY
> be
> describing the situation but also committing himself to an ABSURD GLOSS
> on the situation (e.g. that Charles's decapitation willed his death)"
> [since
> 'to cause' is to 'will' in animistic parlance]..."
>
> And so on.
>
> Cheers,
>
> Speranza
>
> -----
>
> Grice: "Sensitive Englsh speakers (which most of us are not) may be able
> to mark this distinction by discriminating between 'shall' and 'will',
> Grice
> regrets. "'I shall-I go to London' stands to 'I intend to go to London'
> analogously to the way in which 'Oh for rain tomorrow!' stands to 'I wish
> for
> rain tomorrow'."
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------
> To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off,
> digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html
>
Other related posts:
