Abstration and Epistemology particals (was Re: Gender in pronouns) Rob Zook Wed, 14 Oct 1998 15:58:56 -0500 MDriest wrote: > > Another idea: > - different stages of abstractness. This may need some work. > > Does everyone remember Lyras' speech about abstract words? > We could have words in categories: concept (totally abstract), derived > or semi-objective, and object. This is definitely something I've been working on. I'd like to see a set of abstractor particles one could apply to words to distinguish it's level of abstraction, and a set of source particals which would refer to a level of confidence. I'd like to base the > C'Thia would be conceptual. There is nothing you can point at and say > that it is 'C'Thia'. It has no practical relation with the physical > world. I would not call that entirely accurate. C'Thia in our minds simply refers to a rather fuzzy set of ideas about Vulcan logical practices, theories and applications. That the set of fuzzy does not mean you can't point to practice X, practice Y, and practice Z and say that 70% of Vulcans would agree these practices exemplify the ideal of C'Thia. However, I would certainly agree that it seems very abstract in nature. There is no _one_ thing which the word refers to but there is a fuzzy set that the word refers to. Using fuzzy logic (which I only have a passing familiarity with unfortunately), a Vulcan could probably describe the nature of C'thia very precisely in a particular situation. > The Vulcan Academy would IMO be semi-objective meaning there is a real > set of buildings but when you say "The Vulcan Academy" you still draw > on a variety of objects for defining what the Vulcan Academy is. And a set of abstractors would certainly help clarify how you mean the phrase "Vulcan Academy". > A derived word could be a word like "seskahlna" (made up), meaning a > 'priests' staff'. There is an actual stick or staff that would be > objective but that's not all there is to it. > > 'Plant' or 'house' would be objective as you can point to a clear > thing. A particular plant our house would have a specific reference. Like a Day Lilly, or Sarek's House, but not just the words "plant" or "house". > This distinctions make sense in a language and culture where it is of > great importance to make clear how your logical thinking precisely > developed. In Terran languages it is often hard to put into sounds > precisely and accurately what exactly went on in your mind. This is > clearly not desirable. Definitely, I agree. I think the "Structural Differential" of Korzybski gives us the best methodology of expressing these levels of abstraction. My copy of the book, _Science and Sanity_ where he describes it in detail I have packed away for the moment, but I will get a copy of it from the library tonight and attempt to describe it and it's use more precisely. In general, the Structural Differential refers to a specific model of the "structure" of various "levels" of abstraction and how they relate to each other. Some important levels: Event - The level beyond all sentient abstraction Object - The basic sensory experiential level (preverbal) Symbol - various levels of abstraction which involve words and concepts Sign - high level representations of the event level (i,e. scientific theories) Essentially the main relationships between these levels loops around. The Event level refers to those sources of energy which we suppose exist outside our bodies and minds which may output energy that impacts on our senses. We never really gain any direct contact with this level and only suppose it exists and describe it with abstractions on other levels. The object level refers to the direct objects of our experience. The "tree" I see, touch.,etc, for example. Symbol levels represent all the various ways I can abstract the experiential tree into words and pictures. Basically, all the stuff I can do to express my experience of the tree to another sentient. Sign levels represent very high level abstractions which have a high correlation of structural similarities to the Event level. Now this is a very basic description of something I read about quite a while ago. So any logical problems in it, may be due to my descriptive abilities and memory. I will try to reproduce the section from _Science and Sanity_ as soon as I can get my hands on a copy. Now, using the Structural Differential as a model we could have abstraction particals one can add to entity or action-state words which indicate their relative level of abstraction. Like, I could have an abstraction partical (which I'm just going to call an abstractor from now on) which refers to the object level (or a _set_ of sensory specific abstractors). So I could say something about the "seen-tree" as opposed to an "idea-tree" (symbol level), or "biological-tree" (sign level). Which would make certain things hard, if not nonsensical to say. Like what could a "seen-peace" refer to? Or a "smelled-justice" mean? It would clearly distinguish highly abstract words as not-directly experiential events, and keep them from being talked about and discussed as if they were "things". Also, we can use something which lojban calls evidentials, particles which express a relative degree of certainty. One could say with some precision the source, reliabiility - in brief the justification or source of knowledge for a statement. Some possible evidentials: direct experience operational instructions for the experience hearsay unspecified source For example we could say something like, "The 'operationally-known- electron' has a positive charge". Or "(the electron has a positive charge)-'known operationally' via this procedure..." depending on the emphesis we wish to make. In formal Vulcan I think both of these kinds of particles should be required for gramatical correctness. Although, by default I think that for a unqualified word, we could consider it as having an 'unspecified source' and existing at the 'symbol level'. A really simple way of describing these two sets of paticles, simple at least in philosophical terminology) as epsitological and ontologically relating particles (for the evidentials and abstractors, respectively). Now, to bring up something totally unrelated, I think Vulcan particles could be useful by themselves as words - perhaps in response to a question. So given that Vulcan is an agglutinative language perhaps we should create a "null" action/state or entity, that one can attach them to, instead of just letting them "hang out" there. I suggest this because in certain areas of speech like mathematics a null action/state or entity would also prove useful. So, for example, if someone asks a specific empistemological question like: "How did you know about the tree", one could respond with the visual sensory abstractor+the null word+any useful tense aspect particles and it would act as a very nice short hand for "I know it because I saw/am seeing/expect to see it". However, using a sensory abstractor in the future tense in response to an epistemological question seems rather suspect, and we might want to consider it ungrammatical. Rob Z.