2. Meanings and information units
We know from physics that quantity is a universal characteristic of the
real world. However, quantity could not be perceived without another
universal characteristic, which is the property to be substituted and
which we will call electivity . Let us show their mutual need by a
simple example of perceiving a spatial object. One can estimate an
object’s size, that is, its quantitative value as its spatial extension,
thanks to its boundaries in space11Here we leave aside that the
perceived size of objects depends on a number of factors. See,
however, Tal Makovski (2017), “investigating how the boundaries of an
object and, particularly, the absence of these boundaries, impact its
size perception”. (whether they are its external line, its color,
matter, texture, form or structure). The mutual need of an extension and
boundaries consists in that an extension doesn’t exist without
boundaries, as well as boundaries don’t exist without extension. But
their characteristics are different: When determining an object’s value
in this way, we assume that what we call quantity has a property which
distinguishes it from a boundary (which we consider ideal, that is,
without extension). Quantity has a property to be accumulated: The
smaller is included in the larger; and a boundary can’t be accumulated
but has a property to be substituted. Take, for instance, a
two-dimensional object on the surface, where its boundary is a line.
Although the boundary has a quantitative value as everything in reality
– its smaller part is included in a larger one, in order to get from
this line to another one, it is necessary that the other line
substitutes the first one. In other words, an extension has to be
accumulated (quantity characteristic) and a boundary has to be
substituted (electivity characteristic).
Our assumption is that speech information is also characterized by
parameters with the quantity property of accumulating and the electivity
one of substituting. But unlike the parameters of a real object, which
represent its quantity, the parameters of information, being its
component, don’t represent the real quantity of it and don’t indicate
its substitutability. As the parameters don’t reflect the true quantity
and electivity characteristics of the information, there must be a
mechanism of their genesis to be introduced into information. One can
explain the difference between quantity and electivity with minimal
number of notions (in order not to “multiply entities without
necessity”) through the use of derivative elements generated in
operations from initial ones. Given that quantity and electivity are
mutually needed, the respective operations – quantitative and elective
ones – must be coupled. Coupling operations means that both operations
are being performed together from the initial elements. The quantitative
operation, reflecting the quantity property, introduces a relationq 0 ˂ Q , where q 0 is
a quantity being part of the quantity Q 22One can see
quantity determined as above in brain. Signals perceived by our five
major senses represent object’s quantifiable parameters – bright or
dim light of a particular colour, loud or soft sound of a particular
pitch, strong or not strong touch, strong or weak smell, intense or
poorly perceived taste. Quantitative parameters are integrated in a
process of recognition – as a shape and colour of the object, as a
cumulative effect caused by stimulation of olfactory receptors, etc..
We don’t use the symbol ˂ as in mathematics to mark that one number is
less than another. It means here that the quantity Q hasq 0 as its accumulated part. The elective
operation performs a substitution e 0 → E ,
where e 0 is a substituted element, E , a
substituting one. The elements brought out from the operations become
static and constitute bits of nonsemantic information. We will call
these elements operational states and the combination of the
operational states accompanying a semantic information in speech,operational information . The operational states can be used in
semantic information while remaining coupled or separately (see
further). So the quantity operation means that the initial quantitative
state q 0 is included in the including derivative
quantitative state Q 33The terms “includes, including”
and “is included” are chosen because they express the gist of
respective operational relations and are in no way related to set
theory. and the electivity operation means that the initial elective
state e 0 is substituted by the substituting
derivative elective state E , introducing a relation of separate
states. There is a difference between the initial and the derivative
states of the two operations. If the initial states are determined only
by their opposition to the operation as a process, the derivative states
are also characterized by a different relation to the initial states. If
the derivative quantitative state can be determined as including, the
initial state remains undetermined in the operation. It can, in turn,
include another state or no state but always accompanies the derivative
state and that’s what makes it involved in quantity. Similarly, if the
derivative elective state can be determined as substituting, the initial
state remains undetermined. It can substitute another state or no state
but the substituting state is formed through it. That’ why not only the
substituting but also the substituted state is characterized by
electivity.
The available means of describing linguistic meanings, in particular by
means of componential analysis, semantic decomposition or through their
definition, disintegrate the meanings via other whole meanings to reveal
their structure. We say “whole” on the understanding that words can be
found to express them. So meanings are described with recourse to a
form. But can we describe meanings without recourse to forms?
Aphasia demonstrates that meaning and its form diverge in certain
circumstances. Dronkers and Baldo (2009: 343) describe patients with
anomic aphasia as follows:
When searching for a word, some patients with anomic aphasia paraphrase
using words that they can easily retrieve. For instance, a patient shown
a drawing of a pair of tongs said “You pick up things with it.” Such
circumlocutions demonstrate that patients with anomic aphasia have lost
neither conceptual understanding nor the ability to build coherent
sentences and phrases.
Whereas circumlocutions may be a characteristic feature of the speech of
some patients with anomic aphasia, the main characteristic displayed by
other patients may be periods of slow and halting speech as they search
for the correct word. For instance, when shown a picture, a patient
might say, “It’s a, ummm, uhhh, a, a, a … I know what it is,
it’s a … Aww hell, it’s there but I just can’t get it.”
The message of the examples with aphasia is that the patients possessing
the notion of the thing can’t remember the word which means the notion
that enables naming.
Now, let’s imagine that a word is omitted (or not heard), but we can,
however, understand the sentence. Its understanding is possible if we
turn to a meaning which is to a greater or lesser extent determined by
the sentence or the context so that the missing word can be absent in
language at all or, if it is not, be selected by its meaning. For
example, to understand the sentence Up the
<…>, on the second floor , we turn to the
meaning ʻsomething we can climb to get on the second floorʼ or to more
specific meanings, which can be then expressed by the wordsstairs, ladder, tree , etc. W. Chafe (2018: 28) argues: “Because
the thought-sound association is such a pervasive aspect of daily
experience, it can be surprisingly difficult for anyone who is old
enough to speak to separate the two. … I recently had occasion to
think over well-known film director whose name … was briefly
inhibited. … I was conscious of everything about him except his
name. It wasn’t long before the sound Alfred Hitchcock found its
way back to my consciousness, but while it was absent the thought-sound
association lacked its bottom half. … Separating a thought from a
sound can be experienced in the opposite direction in rote learning.”
It is also known that polysemy is explained by the ability of a
linguistic sign to accumulate more than one meaning under one form. But
a word polysemous in dictionary loses its polysemy (or actualizes double
meaning) in speech.
All this shows that meanings activated in speech by a speaker or an
addressee are detached from the signs even if the semantic relations
among the words are formed or maintained. We will call meanings in
speech detached from signs information units . The information
units get rid of the symbols to become an informational continuum, a
formulated thought.
Now we will proceed to the description of information units without
recourse to forms and see in what way operational states characterize
them.