I have to confess that I have not yet had the time to review the
paper that opened this session.
Metaphors aside, what you have described here is consistent with
information theory, is it not? Except that you have not defined
"meaning." In particular, you do not suggest how "a meaning" might be
measured so that it can be compared.
From my point of view the appropriate definition of meaning is that
a meaning is a behavior. This is a useful definition that is
malleable to comparison. It applies in all semantic cases from
computer science to biophysics. Meaning then is the behavioral
product of a communication "in a system," it is the ultimate product
of apprehension through semeiosis in a biophysical system.
"Exactness" then, as you suggest, is the degree to which behaviors
are similar - but I am certain that this would distress Shannon
because the comparison is external to the system; it requires a
privileged point of view. Indeed, it distresses me.
A more interesting approach is to assume that the behavior between
like systems is deterministic; assume that the effective transmission
of a "meaning" is determined if only both the signal is complete and
clear, and the sender and receiver are similar systems.
Thus if sign S produces behavior B in the sender, then the complete
and clear transmission of S to R, the receiver, will produce behavior
identical to B in the systems R to the degree that R is similar to S.
So, it is not that meaning itself cannot me communicated, but rather
that the systems involved vary. In the case of members of our
species, our constant system modification by the variety of our
sensory inputs changes the behavior potentially produced by a given
sign at any given point in time.
With respect,
Steven
--
Dr. Steven Ericsson-Zenith
Institute for Advanced Science & Engineering
http://iase.info
http://senses.info
On Oct 2, 2007, at 9:17 AM, Guy A Hoelzer wrote:
Greetings All,
In my view ‘meaning’ exists (or not) exclusively within systems.
It exists to the extent that inputs (incoming information) resonate
within the structure of the system. The resonance can either
reinforce the existing architecture (confirmation), destabilize it
(e.g., cognitive disequilibrium), or construct new features of the
architecture (e.g., learning). Social communication often involves
the goal of re-constructing architectural elements present in the
mind of one agent by another agent. I am using highly metaphorical
language here, but a very straightforward example of this at the
molecular level is the transfer of structural information between
prions and similar proteins folded in ‘ordinary’ ways. In this
sense, meaning itself cannot be transferred between agents;
although a new instance of meaning can be constructed. This is
essentially the idea behind the Dawkins model of populations of
memes (concept analogs of genes).
>From this point of view, the ‘exactness’ of a meaning doesn’t seem
to make sense. A meaning defines itself without error. It would
make sense, however, to talk about the degree of similarity between
meanings when the social goal was to replicate a particular
instance of meaning. Perhaps this is what Jerry meant and I have
over-analyzed the idea here, but if this is a novel or erroneous
perspective I would like to see some discussion of it. I guess my
main point here is to separate the notion of meaningfulness from
the social context that demands the sharing of meanings and
constrains the construction of meanings to resonate at the level of
the social network.
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