goofy wrote:I don't see what philosophy has to do with it.
It's not to do with the philosophy per se, it's the inaccurate (or at least contentious) assumption implied by the conflation of meanings. That the assumption is philosophical in nature in this case is unimportant to the linguistic point.
Consider if, somehow, many people came to associate east coast society with upper class things and west coast society with lower class things, to the point that saying that something was upper-class often implied that it was eastern. And then imagine that because of that conflation, people began to misuse "upper-class" to mean
literally eastern. And then at some point you have a conversation where someone says "the Appalachians are fairly lower-class..." and some moron 'corrects' him that "the Appalachians are definitely the upper-class mountain range in North America, it's the Rockies that are lower-class",
meaning to say merely that they are the eastern and western ranges respectively, but coming across (to anyone who still uses the literal, correct sense of "upper class" and "lower class") as saying that Appalachian Mountain society is more affluent than Rocky Mountain society. And then imagine, hundreds of years later when that usage has become totally standard, kids who go off to college and encounter the term "upperclassmen" for the first time, and assume that those must be the guys who live in the eastern dorms...
So the word has different meanings in different contexts. In philosophy it means one thing, and in common parlance it means something else.
It's not even an issue of one word meaning one thing in philosophy and something else in common parlance. It's an issue of several related words, one of them common in common parlance and the others common only in rarer academic circles (not only philosophy), no longer having related meanings. It is no longer easy to accurately guess what "norm" or "normative" mean from their common root with "normal", and conversely there is no longer a simple adjective meaning "in accordance with norms" the way "normal" used to and intuitively should. A pattern which would make the language easier to learn and to use no longer exists, and the language is at a loss for that.
Language is always full of ambiguity and multiple meanings.
Sure, maybe it is. But ought it be? That is the question at hand. My initial proposition, under debate now, is that one can put forward judgements about how things ought to be without appealing either to how they are, or how some arbitrary authority says they ought to be. You imply that things being so entails that they ought to be so, when that once again
begs the question assumes the conclusion.
The history of a word is irrelevant to its current meaning.
So how much time must have elapsed before a meaning is no longer "current"? If everyone in the world avoided using a word for a day, would the first person to use it the next day get to pick whatever meaning he wanted for it, and that would be the new "current" meaning and everyone should go with that instead of committing the "etymological fallacy" and insisting on two-days-ago's meaning?
The point I am making is very much a consequence of one you keep reiterating: words are defined by their use. Consequently,
suddenly breaking with that use is
misuse, using them to mean something they don't mean. We look at how people
have used words to determine how
to use them. "Current" usage is just the instantaneous junction between past usage and future usage. Any usage you can cite, by virtue of having already occurred for it to be citable, is past usage; it's just a question of how far past.
I am not saying that older usages are superior by virtue of being older, but that, looking at each change as though you were there in the moment it was occurring, some changes are sensible extensions of existing usage that would be understood and accepted by expert users of the language at that time (i.e. people with extensive knowledge of the word's use up to that point) as metaphorical or figurative or representative uses to be judged by the quality of the metaphor, representation, etc. Conversely, other changes are, at the time they occur, misuses due to ignorance or perhaps apathy (or malice if Eugo is correct). The latter are mistakes; being widely propagated only makes them widely propagated mistakes. Being
old mistakes doesn't make them cease to have been mistakes either, any more than another meaning being older makes it more legitimate (which, again, I am not claiming).
If some PHB starts using "flatulent" to mean "flattering" tomorrow, without understanding that the word doesn't (currently) mean what he intends by it, is that a legitimate change of meaning, or a mistake? What if his equally-ignorant friends pick up on that use? And then it spreads throughout the management culture in general, eventually getting picked up by people in the media, and then spreads to the ignorant people in the populace, while those who already knew the difference between "flatulent" and "flattering" laugh at the whole mess? At what point does it stop being a hilarious mistake, and a word for farts suddenly, legitimately, becomes a word for compliments instead? If there is such a point, and we reach it, does that retroactively make that first PHB's first use no longer a mistake?
I'm willing to concede that once everybody has shifted to the new usage, the word really has acquired a new meaning, since there is no more conflict, no controversy to settle; everyone just uses it the new way now. That doesn't make the change in meaning not a mistake to begin with. Likewise, if one population moves into a territory, kills off the native population, and settles there, they really do own it now, as it's not like the dead people are still around to demand it back, there is no ongoing violence of withholding someone else's property from them. But that doesn't legitimize the invasion which lead to that scenario.
It seems to me that you're doing the same thing many prescriptivists do: claim that current usage isn't as important as your opinion on how a word should be used, then picking a random meaning and claiming that is the real meaning of the word, then appealing to etymology or logic to justify your claim.
And you seem to be doing the same thing that many self-proclaimed descriptivists (nevertheless passing prescriptive judgement) do: claim that however things are is how they ought to be, and yet at the same time, that as soon as something changes from the way it was a moment ago, that is the new way things are and thus how they ought to be. You don't see the contradiction in there? The closest consistent position to that would be to say that all uses are acceptable, but then you can never tell anyone they've made a mistake; there are no such things as errors in such a view. But any language is defined by its rules, so such linguistic anarchism would destroy language; we'd all be Humpty Dumpty meaning whatever we want to mean by whatever words we use.
We could be authoritarian prescriptivists to solve this problem, and let some arbitrary authority arbitrarily dictate what words mean, but that has all kinds of problems of its own; who is the authority and why are they the authority, why should we care what they say? We could be majoritarian prescriptivists, and say that as soon as a usage is adopted by over half the population, it becomes legitimate and no longer a mistake, but that has its problems too; how does the spread of a mistake make it cease being a mistake, and how far spread is enough?
This is why I started this thread off with an analogy to ethics. We are language-users and language-makers, and there are thus two questions to be asked about people and their languages: how do we use them, and how ought we make them? There are both descriptive questions and prescriptive questions; it's not a matter of choosing description or prescription, we can and must do both. And the potential answers to the latter questions face the same problem that all prescriptive questions in any field do.
You can't say that the prescriptive questions have no answer because by our actions we will assume one by default, and then what do we default to? Accept all changes? Reject all changes? Why? If we accept all changes, we destroy the language, as there becomes no incorrect use and thus no correct use and anything can mean anything. If we reject all changes, we're stuck with the language as it exists now, and so how do we pick at which point to start rejecting all changes, why is the language so perfect right then, why were all the earlier changes acceptable -- and what about extant differences, are each of our own varying usages to be adhered to forever despite any misunderstandings there may be between them?
Both those default options lead directly to patent nonsense and arbitrariness. But if we are to accept some changes and reject others, then on what grounds? Both authoritarian and majoritarian answers face similar problems of arbitrariness: why is it not binding when I say to use a word this way, but it is when he does? And who has that power and why? Why is it a mistake if one person uses a word this way, but not if many do? And how many is enough? What difference does who or how many make? And if neither of those options work, then what
are good reasons to either accept or reject a usage, since we evidently have to pick when to do which?
You keep stating the answer, and then running from its consequences. Words are defined by how they are used. When asking how
to use a word, we should ask how it
has been used. When asking how to use a word (that is to say,
in the future), we should ask how it has been used (that is to say,
in the past). Correct future usage is that which is continuous with past usage. Discontinuous usage is misusage.
Such discontinuity is what makes the very etymological fallacy you keep levelling at me a problem: it rejects recent usage in favor of much older usage. I am not advocating the rejection of current usages. I am advocating the rejection of new breaks from the continuity of usage, and to a lesser extent, the gradual amelioration of past breaks from continuity; and meanwhile, full acceptance of semantically continuous new usages.
gmalivuk wrote:For my part, I adopt or reject words and expressions based on a variety of factors, one of which is whether it will be understood by my audience. But I also consider things like whether it will harm or marginalize anyone, whether it could be replaced with a more general or more specific word that is more suitable to my present needs, whether another more commonly used word already means what I want this one to mean and has the advantage of being more readily understood and accepted by my audience, and so on. This means, among other things, that I speak differently around different people for different reasons.
I agree with heeding these kinds of concerns, and say that being understood sets the outermost limit on what constitutes acceptable use of language. Whatever other concerns you heed, like those I'm advocating, you must at least be understood. But within the set of things that will be understood by your audience, there is room for variation, and I'm arguing that not everything that will be understood is equal.
I'm a web developer, and the languages I use in that capacity actually have authoritative standards set for them. However, those standards are frequently ignored, to varying degrees, often out of sheer ignorance or apathy; and even the standards themselves are sometimes inadequate or clumsy, and could be done better. As a web developer, the minimum level my writing in these languages must reach is something that will be understood by the bulk of varying web browsers that read it. Within that minimum, however, there is much room for variation, better and worse code; most browsers will pretty well understand some really garbage code, because they have to, because people write a lot of garbage code. Adhering to the authoritative standard frequently results in better code, and a greater chance of being understood by a wider variety of browsers. However, sometimes you have to break from the authoritative standard in order to be understood by drooling idiots like Internet Explorer; and other times, there are ways to sensibly extend or amend the standard to allow you to write even better code to an even better, non-authoritative standard, and still be understood well enough. Future browsers and standards both adapt themselves to such extensions and amendments, and so the ability to write clear, easy-to-read and easy-to-write code and be understood develops further as people boldly go ahead and do so. Of course, future browsers and standards have also been influenced by poor coding practices, so the use-it-to-make-it process works for both good and ill.
I think that this situation is analogous to the situation in any natural language too. You have to be understood by your audience; but within that minimum requirement of being understood, there is room for much variation, and not all variations are equal; often times following the guides of prominent authorities will help you make more sense and thus be better understood; but sometimes you have to break with such guides in order to be understood at all; and sometimes those guides place unjustified limitations or impositions, and going beyond or against them is perfectly fine, even commendable; and such variations within the realm of understandability, and extensions and amendments to prominent guides, will influence both future understanding and future guides; and that influence can be either for the better, or for the worse.
What I am arguing about in this thread is what pattern of variations within those limits will make that influence for the better, and which will make it for the worse.
gmalivuk wrote:"[some sentence involving X]"
"You shouldn't use 'X' (that way), it doesn't make any sense in light of Y and Z..."
"Too bad, people do use it that way (look, here are some {uses by famous people|linguistic statistics}), deal with it, language changes."
That's only a problem because it doesn't address the second person's objection. A better response would be, "Did you understand it? Do many people already use it that way without any problems? Yes? Then by your own admission it actually
does make sense, to you and most others. And language has never been strictly logical, anyway."
Just because many people will understand and use it that way without significant problems doesn't make it an optimal way of saying it. Like web browsers, people are very error-tolerant, and within the realm of things people will be able to understand, there's a lot of variation on what is more or less conductive to greater or lesser understanding, both in that immediate context, and of the language in general should that usage become widespread. On the latter note, I suppose what I'm advocating is a sort of linguistic Kantianism: "speak as though, by your words, you were a lawmaking member of the Academie Anglais" (if there were such a thing; or, your preferred language's equivalent). Because you are. Your usage shapes the future of the language.
Are you seriously going to contend that acceptability is some kind of universal objective fact, superseding any dialectical differences, and that it doesn't follow patterns of actual acceptance?
It's universal and objective to the same extent that ethical acceptability is, which is to say that it is still contextual -- I'm not saying that words have inherent intrinsic god-decreed or natural meaning any more than I am saying that certain actions are always absolutely right or wrong in every context, it's always a question of whether this particular instance of this form of speech or action is acceptable right now in this particular context -- but that there are objective and universal principles to take into consideration, together with the contingent and variable historical facts of the particular situation, when deciding the acceptability of a given instance in a given context.
Dialectical differences are a part of the contingent and variable historical facts of the particular situation. You've always got to speak a language your audience will understand, but within the realm of understandability there is much room for variation. If there are two mutually intelligible but differing regional dialects and a usage common in one is the result of a propagated error in its divergent history, and you have the option of using a more consistent usage and still being understood, I say use the more consistent usage.
But acceptability following patterns of actual acceptance -- no, and that is my main point at the start of this post about there being both descriptive and prescriptive questions about language and how ignoring the second type doesn't make it go away, it just makes you assume some answer to it by default. "Should a usage be accepted?" ("is it acceptable?") is a different question from "will that usage be accepted?" If you try to collapse the former to the latter, you still have to choose (or assume) whether it's any acceptance no matter how small, or unanimous acceptance, or acceptance by whom, or by how many, or on what conditions, which constitutes the acceptance which defines acceptability, and you find yourself having to answer the former question after all.
Any normative statement you make beyond that is nothing more than a personal value judgment, which might be justified or bolstered by logic and etymology and what-have-you, but nonetheless rests fundamentally on your aesthetic opinions about what language should be.
So if all normative judgements are equally unfounded, do we reject them all equally, or accept them all equally? (If they're
equally unfounded then accepting or rejecting them based on who or how many made them for what reasons is out the window already). If we reject them all, then anything goes (someone used it that way, that makes it OK, any judgements of error are unfounded), and words mean whatever anybody wants them to mean, and language is dead. If we accept them all, hello immediate contradictions as we accept opposing judgements.
