Grice, "Lectures on Peirce, Theory of Signs" (Oxford, 1947 -- Hilary Term)

In her bio of _Grice_, Chapman writes, as to amuse R. E. Dale, who knows:

"The mention of 'people' [in "Meaning"] is not backed up by any specific references, but the unpublished papers Grice KEPT THROUGHOUT HIS LIFE include a series of lecture notes from Oxford in which he presents and discusses the 'theory of signs' put forward [by Peirce]."

--- Oddly, Peirce found his lectures seductive enough to address to Lady Welby. Lady Welby, who was single (or not, I forget) created a new discipline out of this. "I'm a significian", she would write back to Peirce. ("would" rather than 'did'?).

Chapman, who spends some sunny weekends in the darkest room of Bancroft (the Berkeley library), writes:

"These suggest that Grice's account of ['meaning'] developed IN PART from his REACTION to Peirce, whose general approach would have appealed to him."

---- It would be more otiose to think that Grice is writing in reaction to Lady Welby. Oddly, Jones notes that there is a Welby near his place. But he means a toponym, not a lady.

---

Chapman then concentrates on Peirce (for a concentration on Welby, see Dale).

"Peirce was anti-sceptical, committed to describing a system of signs elaborate enough to account for the classification of the complex world around us, a world INDEPENDENT of our perception of it, and available for analysis by means of those perceptions."

This above is just wonderful.

"His theory of signs was therefore based on a notion of CATEGORIES as the building blocks of knowledge; signs explain the ways we REPRESENT the world to ourselves and others in thought and in language."

This above is just wonderful.

"In a paper from 1867, Peirce reminds his readers

'that the FUNCTION of CONCEPTIONS is to REDUCE the manifold of SENSUOUS impressions to UNITY, and that the validity of a conception consists in the IMPOSSIBILITY of reducing the content of consciousness to unity without the introduction of it.'"

...

"Conceptions, and the signs we use to identify them, comprise our understanding of the world. Signs act by representing objects to the understanding of receivers, but there are a number of different ways in which this may take place." "There are some representations 'whose relation to their object is a mere community of some QUALITY, and there representations may be termed _likenesses_' such as for example the relationship between a portrait and a person."

A Kilgariff interlude.

In his charming "I don't believe in word senses", he writes, "Surely the Longman Dictionary goes the whole hog when it claims that 'horse' may mean _horse_ or 'representation of a horse', e.g. in painting!" O. T. O. H, my aunt who is a psycho-analyst, gets very irritated when one speaks of the 'phallus' as the _penis_ -- surely it is the _representation_ of the penis, she claims!

Chapman continues: "The relations of other representations to their object 'consists in a correspondence in fact, and these may be termed _indices_ or _signs_." "A weathercock represents the direction of the wind in this way. In the third case, there is no such factual links, merely conventional ones." "Here the relation of representation to object 'is an imputed character, which are the same as _general signs_ and these may be termed _symbols_.'" "Such is the relationship between word and object ... Peirce later extended the general term 'sign' to cover all these cases, and used the specific terms 'icon', 'index' and 'symbol' for his three classes of representation."

Cfr. Wharton on natural codes, -- cfr. pseudo-code (I owe L. J. Kramer for this) and Grice's cursory remarks on non-iconic representation ("Australia's cricket team _represents_ Australia") in "Valedictory Essay" in WoW.

Chapman continues: "In his lectures and notes on "Peirce's theory of signs", Grice analyses Peirce's use of the term 'sign', and proposes to equate it with a geneal understanding of 'means'."

"Grice's chief argument in favour of this equation is that Peirce is not using 'sign' in anything RECOGNISABLE as its EVERYDAY or ordinary sense."

"In a piece of textbook ordinary language philosophy, he argues that 'in general the use (unannounced) of technical or crypto-technical terms leads to NOTHING BUT TROUBLE, obscuring proper questions and raising IMPROPER ones' [emphasis mine. JLS]"

Chapman continues: "Restating Peirce's claims about 'signs' in terms of 'means' draws attention to shared features of a range of items commonly referred to as having 'meaning' as well as hightlighting some important differences between Peirce's categories of 'index' and 'symbol'."

"Grice does not seem to have anything to say about Peirce's 'icons', perhaps because this type of sign is least amenable to being re-expressed in terms of meaning."

"Using his translation of 'is a sign of' into 'means', Grice reconsiders Peirce's own example of an index."

"He observes that the rence the position of the weathercock meant that the wind was NE entails, first, that the wind was indeed NE"

"And, second, that a CAUSAL connection holds between the wind and weathercock."

"This feature, he notes, seems to be restricted to the word 'means'"

"You can say the position of the weathercock as AN INDICATION that the wind was NE BUT it was actually SE. "

"'Was an indication that' is NOT a satisfactory synonym of 'means' because it does not ENTAIL the truth of what follows."

People, some I know, get irritated that Grice quotes so few linguists in his published and unpublished views -- by name.

Is this so? Don't think so.

But then he does quote "factive" in WoW even if he does not credit it to the Genial Kiparskis!

Chapman notes: "The causal connection also offers an interesting point of comparison to different ways in which "means" is used."

"Grice draws on an example that also appears in 'Meaning' when he suggests a conversation at a bus stop as the bus goes."

"The comment, Those three rings meant that that the bus was full could legitimately be followed by a query or 'was it full?'"

Some further marginal comments. This exegesis by Chapman triggered by Grice's comments in "Meaning" that 'words' -- for all that Locke and Aristotle say! -- "are not" [signs].

In my "Humpty Dumpty's conversational impenetrability" (Jabberwocky) I proposed to trace Grice's 'meaning-liberalism' as I called it -- cfr. Bennett on Grice's meaning-nominalism, cited by Dale -- to Locke, via Yolton. Of course, there's also Hobbes, and prior to that, Ockham.

I was fortunate to have to undergo a rather critical study of Ockham's writings in Latin, where plays with sings like

'... significat naturaliter ... '

which looked veritably Gricean: "A stone outside a pub means that wine is sold there" -- Ockham's example. "laughter means inner joy" risus significat naturaliter interiorem laetitiam etc. Hobbes, Computation, on 'natural' signs is a short way to Locke's 'telementational' theory of 'signs' -- discussed in secondary bibliography by Yolton. And recall that Alston, Philosophy of Language, lists Grice as an 'ideational' meaning theorist, along with Locke.

Chapman goes on:

"Grice does not seem to have anything to say about ... icons". THEN, but of course it's all about iconic and non-iconic in the Valedictory essay. And indeed, the examination here should go to Grice's Meaning Revisited. In a passage that should charm Brits -- but NOT Americans -- Grice considers vice --

i. he is in the grip of a vice
ii. he is the grip of a vyce

(as Americans misspell it! :)) 'mean' should NOT be treated like 'vice'. Indeed, 'mean' is _equi_-vocal, Grice has it -- where EQUIvocal Grice uses literally to mean, 'same-voice', i.e. monosemous, or as I prefer, uniguous.

The reference to "mean to" as 'natural' comes from "Meaning" too, and indeed, in "Intention and Uncertainty", Grice proceeds to a neo-Prichardian position he adored, where he will focus on 'intend-that' (Prichard's 'will-that') rather than the more obscure 'intend to'.

The Arsenal fan wills that the player will score a goal Willing-that is thus freed from agent's itentionality. While the football player should INTEND, WILL, OR MEAN to score a goal, a third party may INTEND, WILL, OR MEAN that ... p. This semantic freedom Grice finds, er, liberating.

Incidentally, a plus marginal note here reads, "See Speranza, Plato".

This refers to my very first UNPUBLICATION: a study on Plato's Kratylus, where I attempted the Gricean way of translating, alla Grice, 'is a sign of' (cfr. is an idea of) onto "means"" -- and perhaps failing!

(Cratylus is cited by Dale in his PhD dissertation, too).

The Chinese website to the effect that Grice's theory of natural meaning is almost a 'joke' is a joke itself.

But the connection is made with FRENCH semiotics: the French 'signifier' and 'vouloir dire' are both, clumsiliy, and loosely, meant to stand for 'mean', when we know they DON'T!

And when you get to realise that 'mentIR(E)' in Latin -- cfr. Italian -- as opposed to 'mentAR(E)', means to 'lie' ('do not say what you believe to be false', cfr. Grice) you are ready to call it quits! (but don't).

Stevenson, to go back to the header, is clear that 'means' should be treated as a 'scare-quoted' verb in 'natural' contexts:

Stevenson's example:

The barometer means that the humidity of the room is pretty high.

Stevenson's example, cited by Chapman, being, complete with 'scare quotes' (the point is crucial, because Stevenson is suggesting that this transferred use of 'mean' is anthropomorphic, incorrect, and figurative):

"a reduced temperature may at ties "mean" convalescence".

Incidentally, Green's "Grice's Frown" -- a genial title for an essay, I find -- is all about Grice's tricky example of how a frown -- cfr. Ockham 'risus significat naturaliter interiorem laetitiam' and his 'a tear means inner sorrow' -- may 'mean' _this_ or that.

In 'Meaning Revisited', the justification is evolutionary and transcendental: our first signs are iconic and beyond rational control: we frown when we frown when we frown.

We yawn when we are bored, and we scratch when it itches.

Only at a later 'pirotic' development, do we manipulate these 'natural' items of behaviour, as bridge players are only too well aware. For Grice this is yet another way in which 'communication', to use Gutt's phrase, is but yet another manifestation of that multifaceted and magisterial ability that humans are endowed with by the fact that they (or we, in our better moments, of course) are _rational_. (cfr. my "The feast of conversational reason").

Indeed, Grice concludes his "Meaning Revisited" with a remark very Hobbesian in nature.

If 'means' is EQUI-vocal, then it is replaceable by '... is a consequence of ...' (where this 'consequence' is just the 'effect', causal or other, of a previous co-related 'antecedent'. And the polemic ensues.

By the time Grice wrote "Intention and Uncertainty" he was more into "Pears" (his colleague at Oxford, whom he quotes explicitly there) than Peirce, but that's just Oxonian, right?

But again, his commentary on Peirce should interest Peircieans. Or not. Someone SHOULD edit those notes by Grice. A Perceian, properly sponsored by the Peirce Society would be ideal. Or not!