Quote: meaning in language is based on human, institutional facts, not brute facts of nature; only in the stream of life do words have meaning [»blaiDC6_1992]

Quote: to tell if a speaker mis-spoke, need to infer some of the speaker's meaning prior to the utterance; implies, decoding theories are incomplete [»blaiDC6_1992]

Quote: individualistic approaches to the mental may treat mental events as infallible seeing; neglects social features of the mind [»burgT_1979]

Quote: since Hegel, there is an inarticulate division between private, mental states and the role of social institutions [»burgT_1979]

Quote: we think organization is the answer to intelligence from unintelligent components; but intelligence has third-person criteria that makes the question incoherent [»searJR_1992]

Quote: speech act theory--language and thought is ultimately based on social interaction [»winoT_1986]

Quote: the connotation of an element is the set of similarities noted by hearers of the language about its semantic regularities in the language [»ziffP_1960]

Note: meaning is what different speakers have in common [»martAP_1990, OK]

Quote: regard as real those sense perceptions which are common to different individuals and hence impersonal; e.g., rigid bodies [»einsA_1956, OK]

Quote: the sense of a sign is shared by others; the sense lies in between, not subjective as is the image, but not the object either [»fregG_1892]

Quote: the 'game' of attributing concepts to conforming individuals would lose its point outside of the community [»kripSA_1982]

Quote: the meaning of something is between speakers and hearers; neither what was meant nor what was connoted

Quote: being a chair or a nice day for a picnic is an observer-relative feature

Quote: though no two people perceive reality the same, views overlap enough to allow cooperative work [»kentW_1978]

Quote: much of what we say is based on what others told us; e.g., our belief that Napoleon was the Emperor of France [»winoT_1986]

Quote: meaning cannot be separated from use or the whole complex of inferential, conversational, social, and other purposes to which it is put [»smitBC1_1991]

Quote: understanding is a great ability to avoid equivocation through context, drift, and occasion; we can find out the true meaning of what is said [»hobbT_1650, OK]

Quote: program design is a social activity where designs are developed through presentation and discussions; e.g., discuss design and implementation alternatives [»stroB_1991]

Quote: often, the most important design tool is a blackboard; for developing and sharing embryonic concepts

Quote: meaning is not in the head; consider Twin Earth where only metallurgists know that the names and usages of aluminum and molybdenum were switched [»putnH_1973]

Quote: meaning is not in the head; consider Twin Earth where water is really XYZ yet in 1750 everyone thought they were the same [»putnH_1973]

Quote: there may be many users of the word 'gold' but only metallurgists can recognize gold; i.e., the society determines the meaning of 'gold' [»putnH_1973]

Quote: the extension of a term is determined socially and by the actual nature of particular things; the actual nature is not fully known by the speaker [»putnH_1973]

Note: 'sense' can not both determine reference and the mode of presentation as determined by psychological states [»putnH_1973, OK]

Quote: a real science is about mental contents standing for things; e.g., 'all fire is warming' because 'warming' is a mental content common to every fire [»ockhW_1310]

Quote: the shared, public world is the only world there is; the self is a selection of interpretations made available by the culture [»dreyHL_1991]

Quote: everyday communication can not be understood as context-free messages sent from one isolated mind to another; needs shared background [»dreyHL_1991]

Quote: language depends on a shared, unformalized background; needed at a breakdown to negotiate a new meaning and speak with commitment [»clanWJ1_1987]

Quote: the terms of a proposition assume a context; e.g., 'every dog is an animal' does not apply to the dog star [»ockhW_1310]

Quote: hermeneutics begin as the theory of interpretation of sacred texts; asking why does a text have meaning despite different cultures and language [»winoT_1986]

Quote: a school of hermeneutics takes interpretation as primary; gives meaning to a text, determines our language and ourselves [»winoT_1986]

Quote: the hermeneutic circle--our beliefs can not be made explicit because we are always operating within their framework [»winoT_1986]

Quote: we introduce Maturana's terminology without giving definitions; precise definitions are impossible anyway [»winoT_1986]