We may sum up this theory of meaning in a simple formula. When through
the law of conditioned reflexes, A has come to be a cause of C, we will
call A an “associative” cause of C, and C an “associative” effect of
A. We shall say that, to a given person, the word A, when he hears it,
“means” C, if the associative effects of A are closely similar to those
of C; and we shall say that the word A, when he utters it, “means” C,
if the utterance of A is an associative effect of C, or of something
previously associated with C. To put the matter more concretely, the
word “Peter” means a certain person if the associated effects of
hearing the word “Peter” are closely similar to those of seeing Peter,
and the associative causes of uttering the word “Peter” are occurrences
previously associated with Peter. Of course as our experience increases
in complexity this simple schema becomes obscured and overlaid, but I
think it remains fundamentally true.
There is an interesting and valuable book by Messrs. C. K. Ogden and
I. A. Richards, called _The Meaning of Meaning_. This book, owing to
the fact that it concentrates on the causes of uttering words, not on
the effects of hearing them, gives only half the above theory, and that
in a somewhat incomplete form. It says that a word and its meaning have
the same causes. I should distinguish between _active_ meaning, that
of the man uttering the word, and _passive_ meaning, that of the man
hearing the word. In active meaning the word is associatively caused by
what it means or something associated with this; in passive meaning,
the associative effects of the word are approximately the same as those
of what it means.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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