From: KPJ (kpj@sics.se)
Date: Thu May 18 2000 - 09:25:58 MDT
It appears as if Harvey Newstrom <mail@HarveyNewstrom.com> wrote:
|Semantics again. There is a defined wavelength of light called red. There
|is a defined sensory cone in the eye that is called a red-receptor. There
|is a defined chemical loss in the retina associated with red. There is a
|defined signal along the optic nerve that denotes red. There is a defined
|perception in the brain called red. There is a defined memory encoding that
|stores red.
In the text above, you use what some linguists call "is of identify".
Does all your words "red" above really point at the same concept <red>?
In the standard discussion among humans on this matter, one can easily
remove the problem using the General Semantics method ``indexing'':
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
There exists a defined wavelength of light called red[1].
There exists a defined sensory cone in the eye that exists called a red[2]-
receptor.
There exists a defined chemical loss in the retina associated with red[3].
There exists a defined signal along the optic nerve that denotes red[4].
There exists a defined perception in the brain called red[5].
There exists a defined memory encoding that stores red[6].
\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/\/
Do you mean to state that all red[k] (k=1,...,6) refer to the same phenomenon?
You know, there exists a complication here with the fuzziness of the natural
languages: The ``eye'' you refer to above really does not exist.
There exists a number of different eyes, and eye["Person 1"] and
eye["Person 2"] do not necessarily have the same receptiveness for light,
and thus can (and will) give a somewhat different reception for the same
input light.
Person 1 will state that the eye sensory input matches ``red'' while Person 2
will vehemently state that it does not. They use different definitions of the
word ``red''.
One could of course define the meaning ``red'' with a physical characteristic:
``The word "red" refers to the colour of light with a wavelength between
460 and 780 nm.''. [This probably won't match what _your eyes report, BTW. !-]
Then one could either call humans who do not follow this rule ``colour blind''
(optically challenged?) or ``mistaken'' (semantically challenged?).
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A rose by any other name would smell as sweet
>From Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet. Suggesting that a thing is what it is,
not what it is called. Wally Argus, a correspondent from Alabama, reports that
the reference was a side-swipe that the Globe Theatre's rival the Rose Theatre
which had less than effective sanitary arrangements.
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