March 1985
Principle of radical utility: Usefulness shapes and controls the nature of every language in every aspect.
Language is a technology, by far the most important technology known to man. As with all technology, it is thus an instrument of power, enabling men better to fulfill their desires. The three principal human uses of language are: 1) to share with others; 2) to control others; and 3) to fill up time (phatic use of language).
Language: A set of phonetic, (graphic), (physical), morphemic, syntactic and discourse patterns which are conventions of a given culture used socially to facilitate the fulfillment of desire by the participants in the culture.
Parameters necessary to a language:
1. A community of persons who have a common desire and therefore a need or opportunity to cooperate.
2. A common physical context (to provide primitive definitions by ostensive means).
3. A culture: a common set of values, beliefs about the universe, and appropriate actions (to delimit communication).
4. A set of signals. (Phonemes, letters, gestures, etc.)
5. A defining procedure. A means of associating signals with elements of the physical context to provide potential meanings for those signals.
6. A lexicon. A set of defined signals (typical words associated with typical meanings).
7. A syntax. A set of typical patterns of word and sentence formation used to control meaning.
8. A rhetoric. A set of typical patterns of sentence concatenation used to form conversations and speeches in order to control communication.
Natural language: Any language currently learned by any population as a mother tongue.
Artificial language: Any language specially constructed to meet the needs of an artificially contrived group of persons. All dead languages are artificial languages.
Meaning: The message components which are the basis of sending and receiving of communication. Words have only potential meaning. Only messages have meaning. All messages have expectation as to what will happen next.
Grammar: The rules for producing typical patterns of syntax in sentences in language use.
Rhetoric: The patterns of sentence usage which characterize typical and expert use of language in actual discourse.
Other principles of language:
1. Principle of indeterminacy: There are no correct or incorrect semantic usages, syntactic structures or discourse patterns. Language may come to be used in any way at any time by any person. There are no formal constraints as to what might be effective use of language.
2. Principle of nominalism: Meaning does not inhere in any symbol. Dictionaries give typical potential meanings of a word, not actual meanings. Actual meanings exist only in the minds of speakers and hearers in actual contextual use of words. (Words used have meaning; words mentioned do not.)
3. Principle of typicality: For a given language and a given time/place/culture there is a pattern of typical phonetic, semantic, syntactic and discourse usage, the mastery of which makes one a full-fledged member of that language community. Typicality maximizes the utility of language for ordinary purposes.
4. Principle of atypicality: Mastery of the typical patterns of a language makes it possible to employ language atypically with great power. In every society there is a reservoir of unfulfilled desire. An individual who says new things in a new ways to channel (or harness) that unfulfilled desire assumes a leadership role. The atypical usage must be very close to typicality (thus the leader must have mastered typical usage) but enough different that hearers generate new hope for the fulfillment of unfulfilled desire. Atypicality includes creativity in science, art, literature, politics, etc. Too great an atypicality causes incredulity in hearers. Atypicality which increases one’s social influence is expert use of a language.
5. Principle of parsimony: When language is used for sharing or control, efficiency is important. Thus these uses of language tend to represent a minimum use of energy (words and structures) to accomplish the desire of the speaker. In the phatic use of language inefficiency is important and thus parsimony does not here obtain.
6. Principle of ellipsis: No speaker does or can express all that he means in any finite discourse. The meaning of any utterance is ultimately the total universe of the speaker.
7. Principle of entropy: There is always a loss of information in the process of sending a message. The receiver cannot reconstruct all that the sender intends.
8. The principle of integrality: Every assertion and discourse has three essential parts: A feeling component, and informational component, and an action component. These three factors are always present for both speaker and hearer. In some situations the feeling and action components tend to be repressed, but they are nevertheless present. This integrality of language usage arises out of the integrality of the human being. Every conscious human being is at any given moment feeling something, thinking something, and doing something. The purpose of language use is to affect that integrality in others.
9. The principle of attraction: The community using a given language grows (in relation to rival languages) in proportion to the relatively greater utility of that language.
10. The principle of generality: The more widespread and the greater the number of language experiences a population has in common, the more widespread will be the patterns of atypicality.
11. The principle of diversity: The more a sub-population desires to separate itself from a community, the more non-typical become its language patterns. Non-typical patterns are used when there is a need to:
- a. Discourse in a specialized way about recondite matters (jargon).
- b. Prevent the general population from understanding or penetrating an “in” group (dialect).
12. The principle of admittance: The entre into any social group is to master the typical language patterns of that group.
13. The principle of accession: The key by which to acquire the total culture of any group is to master its typical language patterns.
14. The principle of stability: Typicality in a language is strengthened by faithful usage and by expert use of atypicality.
15. The principle of metamorphosis: Non-typical use is the engine of change in language. All natural languages drift.
Factors which work for the metamorphosis of typicality in a language:
- 1. New environmental experiences.
- 2. Desire for exclusivity.
- 3. Desire for novelty.
- 4. Influential persons who speak non-typically.
- 5. Social interaction with other cultures.
- 6. Preponderance of spoken over written use of the language.
Factors which work for the stability of typicality in a language:
- 1. Constant physical environment.
- 2. Desire for inclusivity.
- 3. Appreciation for ancestors/conventions/traditions.
- 4. Influential persons who speak typically or atypically.
- 5. A written literature which is highly honored and widely read.
Signals (codings) used by a language vary on a scale from totally referential to very presentational.
| 1. Totally referential: | Binary codes Alphabets |
| 2. Moderately referential | Glyphs Pictographs |
| 3. Moderately representational: | Pantomime Pictures Graphs Onomatopoeia |
| 4. Very representational: | Drama/Movies/Television Role playing |
Referential coding maximizes efficiency in communication. Representational coding maximizes efficacy in communication.
Naming (coding) in a language may be random or rational.
Rational coding:
- 1. May assign related names to related referents.
- 2. May assign names based on descriptions from a foreign lexicon.
Random coding occurs by historical accident.
Defining: The process of:
- 1. Pairing a given word or phrase with successive potential meanings as does a dictionary.
- 2. Pairing a given word or phrase with another indicator of the precise class or concept which a user has intended when the original use has failed. Only the user can define the meaning.
There are four standard means of defining:
- 1. Ostension: Pointing to a representation of the meaning in the physical environment.
- 2. Synonomy: Using another word or phrase having the same meaning.
- 3. Denotation: A verbal pointing to a referent which represents the meaning intended.
- 4. Connotation: Using a genus (the larger class to which a class belongs) and a differentia (those properties which individuate the thing being defined from other members of the genus).
Linguistic production: The creation and delivery of discourse by a self and its body.
Levels of linguistic production:
1. Basic level: The arena of the imagination surrounded by the imagined universe of the self. Within that arena, certain alternatives have come to the attention of the self which it does not presently enjoy, such as an idea it desires to entertain, a sensation it desires to have the body deliver, etc. Using the basic desires of the self, the volition (will) of the self chooses a particular potential to seek to make real. (A particular desire becomes the focus of the attention of the self.)
2. Strategy level: Still in the arena of the imagination, the self creates an intent and a plan to fulfill the desire; this intent is:
- a. A feeling (a strength of desire) and a goal.
- b. An action hypothesis (a proposal to affect the universe in order to get it to fulfill the desire).
- c. An image of what the expected result would be if that plan for affecting the universe were implemented.
3. Tactics level: Still in the arena of the imagination, the self creates a specific assertion (to implement the action proposal of 2b above) which it proposes to launch into the universe to fulfill its intent (desire) and which it believes will actually produce the desired result. Several hypotheses may be considered, the one deemed most useful in the value parameters of the self being the one selected.
4. Logistics level: Using speech habits already established, the self encodes sentence(s) and plans a discourse to implement the assertion(s) selected at the previous level.
5. Implementation level: Using body habits already established, the self enphones the sentence(s) encoded at the previous level.
6. Anticipation stage: The self alerts itself to notice, through sensation, what reaction the universe has to the action it has launched.
Levels of linguistic interpretation (the complement of production):
1. Detection of a signal or signal complex from a source deemed to be an agent; delivered to the self in sensation.
2. Recognition of the signal pattern; identification of the words, phrases, sentences.
3. Creation of a hypothesis of sentence interpretation, a hypothetical assertion attributed to the speaker.
4. Creation of a message hypothesis concerning what the speaker is doing
- a. A hypothetical intention for the speaker.
- b. A hypothetical action being performed by the speaker.
- c. A hypothesis as to what is expected next, either in the context or of the interpreting self.
5. An understanding of how the speaker’s action and intentions relate to the universe, including what options that creates for the hearer.
6. A reaction of pleasure or displeasure at what the speaker has done.