Literature/Tables/Blackburn-1984-trigon

speakers (psychology)
theory of meaning		theory of knowledge
language (meaning)	theory of truth	world (metaphysics)

Notes

Source

Literature/1984/Blackburn ^{[^]}

Chronology

• Literature/1994/Chandler ^{[^]}
• Cherry, Colin (1957). On Human Communication: A Review, a Survey, and a Criticism . The M.I.T. Press, 1966. ^{[^]}
• Ogden, C. K. & I. A. Richards (1923). The Meaning of Meaning: A Study of the Influence of Language upon Thought and of the Science of Symbolism. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd. ^{[^]}

See also

• Tables/I-mean-it

minds make words mean things

Comments

Blackburn's trigon may be an interpretation of the triangle of reference put forward by Ogden & Richards (1923), who essentially assumes that words mean nothing by themselves but by way of the user. They pay far more attention to the hearer's than speaker's thought as being influenced by language, hence their subtitle. Thus Blackburn's "speakers (psychology)" is a surprise. Such is his "language (meaning)" as they do suspect language of meaning by itself. Problematic also is his "world (metaphysics)" (ontology?) rather than "world (physics)" since "water" should mean H₂O, as per Putnam (1975).

theory of	philosophy of
meaning	language
knowledge	mind
truth	science

The breakdown of the holistic theory or philosophy as shown on the left appears untenable, especially since the (theory of) meaning matters above all and after all, and along the base line between the word and the world. Either truth or science may matter in addition to that. Either may be distilled through the meaning rather than vice versa. No science without meaning. Logicism such as logic first of all may be mistaken. The base line should be the orthogonal projection of both sides, the verbal or virtual life (language & user) and the real life (user & world - being in the world), as suggested by:

• Hayakawa (1949) Language in Thought and Action,
• Austin (1955) How to Do Things with Words, and so on, not to mention Ogden & Richards (1923).