Re: On {lo} and existence

[ucleaar <ucleaar@ucl.ac.uk>]

Jorge:
> > > I'm lost again. Are there propositions independently of there being
> > > a world (or worlds)?
> > I guess so. They're like numbers. They just exist. There are no conditions
> > on their existence, and so no circumstances under which a given proposition
> > does not exist.
> Well, that may be true for tautologies, because you don't need to
> understand more than the logical connectors to understand them. But how
> can that be so for other propositions? How can there be something like
> a proposition associated with "da blanu" without a world where the
> word "blanu" makes sense to the speakers of the language?

In this world there is a state of affairs in which something is blue.
But there are languages with no word for "blue". These two facts are
entirely compatible. I agree that if nothing in this world was blue,
or perceivable as blue, then we would not expect any language to have
a word for blue, and the concept of blue would exist in no minds in
this world. But we could still say that the predicate blue would exist
but be unknown to any mind.

> What I understand you to be saying is that at least some predicates must
> somehow be there independently of the world and the speakers.

I am saying this. I don't really see why it matters.

> But for non-empty propositions, you need the
> speakers in order for the proposition to arise. Without them, you don't
> have a convention for the predicates, and you don't have a proposition.

One can equally well think of propositions not as "arising", but as
already existing - as an infinite set of states-of-affairs. When a
speaker "creates" a new predicate or proposition, this involves picking
one of those already existing propositions of the shelf.

> Unless {broda} has meaning, {da broda} can't give a proposition, I hope
> you agree.)

I agree.

> > > Consider a simple sentence: {da blanu}. How can you associate a
 proposition
> > > to it unless you know the meaning of the word "blanu"? How can this word
> > > have meaning without there being a world out there (with real and
 imaginary
> > > components) with things that satisfy the predicate or don't?
> > Am I saying otherwise?
> Maybe you are, I don't know. Do you agree that propositions don't arise
> without there being a language?

No.

> And that there is no language without a world which contains the
> referents of arguments and the conventional meanings of predicates?

Yes.

> > And I am using a more restricted definition of "world" than
> > you - a world contains only real things.
> Including numbers? What does that definition of world buy you in terms
> of explaining the grammar? What do you do with references to non-real
> things? Can there be such references in speech?

What this definition buys me, is a way to distinguish between real and
non real. References to things non-real in this world are references to
things real in some other world. We can refer to things that are in other
worlds.

> By "the world" I mean all the things that can be values of {da}.

I'm quite happy to grant you the use of "world" to mean "world
of things that can be referred to", and for my purposes to speak of
"world of things real in that world".

You can think only-real worlds as like countries. Certain things (e.g.
there being a poplulation of over 100 million) are true *of* certain
countries, but *in* every country they are true of certain countries.
In one country you can refer to things in other countries. The boundaries
between countries are determined by geography; the boundaries between
only-real worlds are determined by reality.

> > But I don't think that makes
> > much difference, for while you say no proposition can be outside *the*
> > world, I would say no proposition is outside every world. If you're
> > happier merging my infinite multiplicity of worlds into one, that's okay.
> I wonder how you would translate that into Lojban. In what world would
> you evaluate that sentence? Can you talk in one world about other worlds?
> If yes, then are there things that can't be values of the unrestricted
> {da}? For that sentence to make sense, "your infinite multiplicity of
> worlds" must have a referent in this world. So at least they are merged
> in this world. You deny that there is only *the* world, but you assume
> it in your speech. Unless there are worlds of which we cannot talk about,
> but by mentioning them I am talking about them, so that doesn't help.

It seems to me that we are using "world" in two different senses, one
defined by reality, and one by reference. Each sense is valid; we must
simply distinguish them.

> > > How do you determine whether a referent is or is not in the world?
> > You inspect the only-real world.
> And what does that tell you? Once you've determined that a referent
> is not in the only-real world, what do you do with it in terms of
> grammar?

Is grammar involved in these issues?
To test whether the proposition expressed by {le prenu cu blanu} is
true of this world, find the referent of {le prenu}. find the set
of blue things, and see if that latter contains the former. To test
whether the prop expressed by {da blanu} is true of this world, find
the set of blue things, and see if it's non-empty. What's the problem?

> > > In your proposition true(prop23, world73, 1), are the referents of
> > > "prop23" and "world73" in the same world?
> > They don't have referents. Prop23 is in world73.
> What are you talking about, then? For "Prop23 is in world73" to be
> meaningful, there has to be something that is prop23 and something that
> is world73. Otherwise it's like saying "gsrw is in ncksy", not very
> informative.

I misunderstood your question, I think. You were asking "Are prop23 and
world73 in the same world?". The answer is: Yes, if a world is held
to contain itself, in which case world73 contains world73 and prop23,
and, otherwise, No - world73 contains prop23, but no only-real world
contains them both. Presumably your one all-encompassing world includes
them both.

> > I share the fairly mainstream view that
> > as far as psychologically real accounts of meaning go, truth-conditionality
> > is a sometimes methodologically useful fiction, the philosophical
> > underpinnings of which aren't terribly important.
> Whatever, but before you evaluate a truth-condition, you need to understand
> the meaning of the predicate. In natlangs, this meaning is almost always
> context-sensitive.

I don't understand "the meaning of the predicate" - the meanings of some
words are predicates. Are you saying that some words vary in what their
sense is, depending on the context of the utterance? I tend not to agree
with that, but anyway it's not relevant to truth-conditionality, which
pertains to the relationship between a meaning and a world, not to
the relationship between a word and its meaning. [There are no typos
in the "world"s and "word"s in this para.]

----
And