Act/Object In a message dated 8/11/2004 5:26:55 PM Eastern Standard Time, junger@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx writes: As a text it seems to me that the computer program should be treated as any other text, although there are many who argue that since it is not directed at communicating something to other human beings it is not entitled to such protections. (That's usually where the claim that a program is a device arises.) --- This may relate to Grice's "mean". He would say (and I read Searle arguing for this) that a computer programme "means" _naturally_. While human communicators "mean" non-naturally (and thus 'communicate'). But the distinction is troublesome. A thermostat is usually chosen as an example of a device that _naturally_ means what it indicates (as black clouds 'mean' rain). For Grice -- in "Meaning Revisited", in Studies in the Way of Words -- there is actually a continuum between 'natural' and 'non-natural' meaning anyway... ------ As a process, on the other hand, it seems to me that a computer program should only be regulated in the same way that other processes---like writing or printing or speaking---that produces signs or symbols are regulated. I hope that there are others on the list who can direct me to discussions that relate to this concern of mine. --- This may be related to, again, Grice's commentary on the act/object distinction. His Paul Carus Lectures he titled, "The conception of value", and noted that he was intentionally playing on the 'ambiguity' of 'conception'. A conception can be in the conceiving, or it can be a _conceptus_. Ditto for 'implicature', where he would distinguish between the 'implicating' and the 'implicatum'. I'm not sure a nominalist would accept such distinctions though. Take love -- there's 'loving' -- and there's the lover and the beloved. But essentially, there's _loving_ (the process). Without the process there would be no 'product', no object, and no subject either. (There is a related discussion in aesthetics, where some theorists aim to define art in terms of the artists's _performance_ while others focus on the 'object d'art' -- Geary has written extensively on this in "The Chicken and the Egg: A Philosophical Dialogue" -- Memphis Press). Cheers, JL ------------------------------------------------------------------ To change your Lit-Ideas settings (subscribe/unsub, vacation on/off, digest on/off), visit www.andreas.com/faq-lit-ideas.html