Humpty Dumptyism

For anyone interested in a rambling dialogue about metasemantics, language individuation, the modal status of semantic (syntactic, etc.) facts, the notion of "cognizing" a language, micro-idiolects, etc., a version of my Humpty Dumptyist dialogue "There's Glory for You!" will appear in the journal Philosophy.

Comments

  1. I found the dialogue stimulating, and don't intend to underrate the experience.

    Although I skimmed the article this time, I want to add some points based on the material found towards the end of the piece.

    If I am correct, most of the argument follows a central thesis having to do with the role of cognition in granting meaning to semantics.

    Here is a little tractatus on how to expand the value of the assumptions:

    [Juncture 1]: [A] Relative neutrality of all linguistic concepts, logic occurs by translating with arbitrary validity, qed. [B] Relative absoluteness: any given term has an opposite. Consequence: universal coherency of concepts, qed.

    [Juncture 2]: [A] If logic is the only option, the choice is for rational or irrational logic. Universal formality, qed. [B] If logic is granted exception from logic, there is room for an object-oriented semantics, qed.

    [Juncture 3]: [A] If all logic is termed irrational, the failure of logic involves the abandonment of formality, qed. [B] If irrationalism is the only formalism, it must be termed a universal irrationalism, or it becomes semantic.

    [Juncture 4]: [A] When paradoxes such as the limit of logic are not paradoxical, all terms are constituents of the same definition, because there is no way that one word is opposite of another, qed. [B] By contrast, when paradoxes are paradoxical, the product is a double paradox (which may be called a paroxysm), which relates equivalent theses which do not contradict one another, qed.

    That's my way of recognizing that the writing on Humpty-Dumpty relates to categorical theory.

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  3. I argue that all negatives are relatively paradoxes. That's one of my unstated arguments. E.g. by pragmatic logic, if one can contradict the desired end, then one can contradict logic. What can contradict logic, can be considered a paradox. Pragmatism is a simple premise because it is presupposed by consciousness, unless irrationalism is accepted, in which case irrationality becomes relatively formal or lacks language to express itself.

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