From: Scott R (jse885@spinn.net)
Date: Thu Nov 28 2002 - 02:37:29 GMT
Matt,
You said in an earlier post:
> Now, I think mystics (specifically you Scott, and I think Platt and Squonk
> would say this) would want to say that not all awareness for linguistic
> creatures is linguistic. This I deny. It begs the question with a
> different langauge game that I've already left.
I responded to this, and the bit about babies and gorillas in a post that
didn't make it, so here's that part again, somewhat edited:
What I make of language games is that after the linguistic turn one should
make a metaphysical turn, and say that language is everything, though one
needs another term to distinguish language in the sense of English, Chinese,
etc., from this metaphysical sense. What I am getting at can be seen by
using Peirce's ideas on Firstness, Secondness, and Thirdness. These
are categories. A First is, say, "redness". A Second is "A causes B", while
a Third is "A understands (or does) B on perceiving C", that is, the act of
interpreting a sign. Peirce points out that a Third is not reducible to a
combination of
Seconds and/or Firsts. So unless one assumes a dualist standpoint, then
since there obviously is language, then there is nothing but language, and
Seconds and Firsts are fictions of our understanding.
So a gorilla does not have some sort of "pre-linguistic awareness", (using
language in this metaphysical sense) but is playing a non-verbal language
game of its own. One might think of instinct as playing the role of concept
in gorilla language games (that's speculation -- more has to change, since
an individual gorilla is not (I assume) self-conscious -- maybe the species
is,
though.). (Added later: in the hot stove, the body is playing a non-verbal
language game in its immediate reaction, then the intellect plays its
language-game. At all levels there is a pattern, there is awareness of
pattern, and there is response to pattern, but these are not three distinct
pieces, rather each exists only in relation to the other two, so none exist
by themselves.)
As you see, so do I deny it [that "not all awareness for linguistic
creatures is linguistic"], but take it an extra step (which I think is at
least implicit in some mystics, especially Buddhists), that it is with this
extra step that one fully grasps the contingency of everything, except the
Absolute, which can be seen as the Ultimate Speaker and Hearer.
- Scott
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