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Full Idea
Our words are not just hot air. Words work because they are something, but the problem is that, if we cannot define a word's meaning, it doesn't really say anything. Can we make a case for it being anything different from the chirruping of chicks?
Gist of Idea
If words can't be defined, they may just be the chirruping of chicks
Source
Zhuangzi (Chuang Tzu) (The Book of Chuang Tzu [c.329 BCE], Ch.2)
Book Ref
Chuang Tzu: 'The Book of Chuang Tzu', ed/tr. Palmer,M /Breuilly,E [Penguin 1996], p.12
A Reaction
This obviously points us towards Quine's challenge to analyticity, and hence the value of definitions (Ideas 1622 and 1624). Even for Chuang Tzu, it seems naïve to think that you cannot use a word well if you cannot define it.
Related Ideas
Idea 1622 Did someone ever actually define 'bachelor' as 'unmarried man'? [Quine]
Idea 1624 If we try to define analyticity by synonymy, that leads back to analyticity [Quine]
| 7279 | If words can't be defined, they may just be the chirruping of chicks [Zhuangzi (Chuang Tzu)] |
| 4721 | If you are not certain of any fact, you cannot be certain of the meaning of your words either [Wittgenstein] |
| 4149 | We don't have 'meanings' in our minds in addition to verbal expressions [Wittgenstein] |
| 4156 | Make the following experiment: say "It's cold here" and mean "It's warm here" [Wittgenstein] |
| 1617 | The word 'meaning' is only useful when talking about significance or about synonymy [Quine] |
| 1609 | I do not believe there is some abstract entity called a 'meaning' which we can 'have' [Quine] |
| 9471 | Intensions are creatures of darkness which should be exorcised [Quine] |
| 1621 | Once meaning and reference are separated, meaning ceases to seem important [Quine] |
| 8202 | Meaning is essence divorced from things and wedded to words [Quine] |
| 19064 | Holism is not a theory of meaning; it is the denial that a theory of meaning is possible [Dummett] |
| 21885 | Words exist in 'spacing', so meanings are never synchronic except in writing [Derrida] |
| 7305 | Kripke's Wittgenstein says meaning 'vanishes into thin air' [Kripke, by Miller,A] |
| 19270 | If you ask what is in your mind for following the addition rule, meaning just seems to vanish [Kripke] |
| 8477 | People presume meanings exist because they confuse meaning and reference [Orenstein] |