practice
Lucyya
PHIL-109-practice.docxPHIL 109:
Read the transcribed lecture below and then submit your answers to the questions following it.
Lecture: “Thinking Through Language”
I recall one experience I had several years ago while living with the Eskimos. I was riding along on a dog sled one bitterly cold day—the wind hit me in the back and seemed to come out the other side—when I turned to a hunter with me and said, as best I could in Eskimo, “The wind is cold.” He roared with laughter. “How,” he said, “can the wind be cold? You’re cold, you’re unhappy, but the wind isn’t cold or unhappy!”
Now this involves more than just another way of speaking, it involves another way of seeing things. Consider how different human actions must appear when seen through the filter of the Eskimo language where, owing to the lack of transitive or action verbs, it is likely to be perceived as a sort of happening without an active element in it. In Eskimo one cannot say: “I kill him” or “I shoot the arrow,” but only “He dies to me,” “The arrow is flying away from me,” just as “I hear” is “me-sound-is.” Similarly, where we say, “The lightning flashed,” as if the lightning did something, as if it involved something more than just being lightning, the Eskimo merely says “flash.” Eskimo philosophers, if there were any, would be likely to say that what we call action is really a pattern of succeeding impressions. Such differences between languages—I don’t mean Indo-European ones like French and German but native ones—are really tremendous. Some languages lack tenses. Of course, I really shouldn't say “lack” because this implies a deficiency, and there’s nothing deficient about these languages. In fact, some can express ideas that English cannot.
Take metaphors: in English when we want to express an emotional or philosophical experience, we have no choice but to use words which refer to real objects or real actions. For example, I might say: “I grasp the thread of your argument, but if its level is over my head my imagination may wander.” How can my imagination wander? Most native languages, on the ether land, distinguish between inner psychological experiences and those that belong to the world of matter.
Let’s take the language of the Trobrianders, a group of Pacific Islanders who live not far from New Guinea. Two famous anthropologists, Bronislaw Malinowski and Dorothy Lee, studied these people, and we probably know more about them than any other native group.
Now the Trobrianders are concerned with being, and only with being (nature, essence, existence). Change and becoming are foreign to their thinking. An object or event is grasped and evaluated in terms of itself alone, that is, irrespective of other beings.
The Trobriander usually refers to it by a word and one word only. To Describe it would be redundant. We define an object in terms of what it is like or what it is unlike or what it can do. The Trobriander is interested only in what it is. To Trobrianders each object is usually grasped timelessly. We must describe it in terms of past, present, future, but, for the Trobriander, these distinctions are non-existent. A word for an object implies the existence of all the qualities it incorporates. If I were to go with a Trobriander to a garden where the taytu (a type of yam) had just been harvested, I would come back and tell you: “There are good taytu there, just the right degree of ripeness, large and perfectly shaped; not a blight to be seen, not one rotten spot; nicely rounded at the tips, with no spiky points; all first-run harvesting; no second gleanings.” The
Trobriander would come back and say TAYTU, and he would have said all that I said and more. Even the phrase “there are taytu” would be repetitious, since existence is implied in being.
And all the attributes, even if he could find words for them in his own language, would have been repetitious since the concept of taytu contains them all. In fact, if one of these were absent, the object would not have been a taytu. If it is unripe, Bwanawa; if overripe, spent, it is not a spent taytu, but a yowana. If blighted, nukunokuna. If it has a rotten patch, taboula. If misshapen, ususu. If perfect in shape, but small, yagogu. If a tuber, whatever shape or condition, is a post-harvest gleaning, ulumadala. When the spent tuber, the yowana, sends it shoots underground, as we would put it, it is not a yowana with shoots, but a silisata. When new tubers have formed on these shoots, it is not a silisata, but gadena. In short, an object is; it cannot change an attribute and retain its identity. As soon as it changes, it ceases to be itself. As being is identical with the object, there is no verb to be. As being is changeless, there is no verb
to become. Becoming involves times, but being to a Trobriander has no reference to time.
With us, however, time is all important. We cannot respond with approval or disapproval unless we know that a thing is getting bigger and better. If I am told that John Smith earns
$4000, I cannot respond to this adequately unless I compare it with another salary. But if I am told that John Smith has been promoted to $4000, I will say “good” or if I hear that he has been demoted to $4000, I will say “pity.” But simply John Smith at $4000 is something I cannot respond to. Our language is full of terms like demote and promote where value is attached to change.
Our language requires that we express nearly all views in terms of time. The Trobriand language, however, has no tenses. Verbs are timeless. Being is apprehended as a whole, not in terms of attributes. This is very difficult for you and me to do. We rarely value sheer being in itself, except perhaps when we are “blindly in love.” When you’re in love, the girl can have large feet, a small mustache, an I.Q. of six, and a father in the penitentiary, but you love her for herself alone. Even mothers in our society are often incapable of valuing children in this way, demanding instead attributes and achievements before they can respond with love. Am I overstating the case when I say that most mothers love the successful child more than the unsuccessful one? The inability to react to being itself sometimes creates embarrassing predicaments for us. Several years ago, a friend, visiting our house, held in his arms our youngest child, age several weeks. “Can he talk?” he asked. “No, of course not,” I said. “Can he walk?” “No,” I laughed. He was a philosopher, you understand. He just stood there, holding a mass of protoplasm, not knowing what to say. We would say, “How bright” or “How clever.” The Trobriander would say, “How baby,” and he would respond emotionally in a situation where we cannot.
In our society, the tendency both in love and friendship, is to be attracted by qualities rather than persons. We like people not for what they are in themselves, but because they are beautiful or rich or amusing, so if they lose theirs looks or their money or their wit, we lose our interest. But for the Trobriander, being is evaluated in terms of itself alone, not in comparison with other things. Again, this is foreign to our thinking, except perhaps in the sphere of art, and even here, we are entering a “twilight of the absolute.” Nowadays we can respond to a work of art only if we know how much it is worth, or who painted it; we are incapable of judging it for itself alone.
Generally, for us, to be good, being has to be as good as, or preferably better than, something else. Our language makes it easy to compare beings at every turn. Our vocabulary provides us with a large number of comparatives. The Trobriander has no such means. Where we
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use similes, where we say I am your JUNIOR, where we stress self-improvement and competition, they employ metaphors. The Trobriander says young man I. The Trobriander emphasizes the status quo and cooperation. Phrases which we commonly hear—“My toy is bigger than Johnnie’s”—“Your dress is prettier than Mabel’s”—have no equivalent in Trobriand. To be, an object must be true to itself, not in terms of its relationship to other beings. To be good, it must be the same always. In Trobriand, nothing—not even the world—ever came into existence; it has always been, exactly as now. Their mythology contains no concept of creation from nothingness. No supreme being ever acted as creator, artificer, or transformer. The Trobrianders don’t find themselves in the awkward position of trying to answer that unanswerable question: “Who created the creator?”
The Trobriander simply isn't interested in chronological sequence. For example, he gives his autobiography in complete disregard for chronology, an effect achieved only deliberately by our sophisticated writers. He begins with the crisis, so to speak, and weaves backwards and forwards in time with many omission and repetitions on the tacit assumptions that your mind is moving in the same groove as his, and that no explanation is needed.
But for us chronological sequence is of vital importance, largely because we are interested not so much in the event itself, but rather in its place within a related series of events. To the Trobriander, events do not fall of themselves into a pattern of cause and effect as they do for us. We in our culture automatically see and seek relationships, not essence. We express relationship mainly in terms of cause or purpose. The maddeningly persistent question of our young children is WHY, because this is the question implicit in most of our ordinary statements and behavior. Every aspect of our lives teaches us to ask WHY, WHY, to seek causes. The Trobriander parent, however, does not entirely escape this questioning, for their children ask WHAT. I might add, our children do too, up until the age of about two or two and a half; then, when they are unconsciously beginning to learn the implicit philosophy in English grammar, then they ask why, why?
Yet the Trobriander has no term for why, nor for because, so as to, cause, reason, effect, purpose, to this end, so that Malinowski’s frequent why evoked from the Trobrianders either confused or self-contradictory answers, or the usual “It was ordained of old.” Just as the conservative Torontonian says, “This is the way we do it here.” I might add that the Eskimos always reply to questions of this type, “Happy people don’t ask questions.”
Now being the value only in a specific setting. Let me illustrate: The early pearl traders offered the natives money and trade goods as an inducement to get them to dive for pearls. But the natives refused, having no use for money and little interest in foreign trinkets. The traders noticed, however, that the Trobrianders set great store by certain large stone blades. First, they imitated them carelessly, but the natives didn’t want them. Next, they had them made of slate in Europe and shipped halfway around the world. But the natives didn’t want them. Finally, they had the native stone quarried and sent to Parisian craftsmen but these beautiful blades were also rejected. And indeed, why would the natives want them? For the blades had meaning only within a patterned activity. Let me give an analogy. Let’s say you’re walking down a street in Toronto, you glance in a window and see a girl who has just received a Valentine. She’s excited and so is the family. There’s hope! Obviously, to her, that Valentine is the most valuable thing in the world. You ring the doorbell and offer her a job. When she asks the salary you say, “One Valentine a week.” It’s a ridiculous situation, of course, because the value of the Valentine lies in the fact it’s February 14, she’s young and in love. In any other setting but its own, the Valentine is worthless and so is the Trobriander’s stone blade.
Now the Trobrianders are not blind to causality; they are quite capable of perceiving events in a lineal pattern. But when a pattern assumes lineality, it is utterly despicable. for example, dating a girl includes giving her a gift. But if a boy gives a girl a gift so as to win her favor, he is despised. Or if she accepts him as a sweetheart just to obtain the gift, not because she loves him, she is regarded as being callous. Similarly, in activity in which the men exchange necklaces and armbands with one another, some men are accused of giving gifts as an inducement to their partner to give them in turn an especially good gift. Such men are labeled with a vile phrase: he barters. For the receipt of a gift: should not cause the Trobriander to do something to give a gift in return; it is understood that he was going to do it anyway. In other words, the Trobriander can experience events lineally, even causally, but when he does, value is either absent or destroyed. In a sense, the gift exchange is not unlike our Christmas giving. I recall that at Christmas time my mother always kept in an upstairs room several presents—the kind suitable for any age, any sex—wrapped, but unlabeled, just in case someone she had forgotten brought her a present. She would then thank them, say, “Just a minute while I run up and get your present,” hurry upstairs, quickly label the present, and then present it. For Christmas presents and cards are spoiled, in a way, if we think the other person has forgotten us or perhaps didn’t plan to give us anything until forced to by the receipt of our gift.
The Christmas pattern is really an exception in our society: it is perhaps significant that children enjoy it most whereas, in Trobriand life, it is the rule. Trobriand behavior is not motivated by a sequence of events, or by any line of activities leading up to something. On the contrary, they do their best to ignore, to refute, such a sequence or line.
But is this line really present? Perhaps it is; maybe it isn’t. But we feel happier when we think it is there. Then the situation has meaning and we can respond to it. If I tell you that Sally married a millionaire, that she’s selling notions in Woolworth’s, that she once worked for Vogue, went to Vassar, and was poor—it’s mere jumble. But if I say Sally was poor, worked at Woolworth’s, saved her money, went to Vassar, worked for Vogue, and then married a millionaire—now it all falls in line and makes sense. Our idea of happiness is bound with this motion along an envisioned line leading to a desired end. Our conception of freedom rests on the principle of non-interference with this moving line which leads to a desired climax. As we see our history climactically, so we plan future experiences climactically, leading up to future satisfaction or meaning. Who but a very young child would think of starting a meal with strawberry shortcake, and ending up with spinach? The Trobriander meal has no dessert, no line, no climax. The special bit, the relish, is eaten with the staple food; it is not something to look forward to while disposing of a meaningless staple.
Now for members of our culture, value lies ideally in change, in moving away from the established pattern. We hopefully expect next year to be better, brighter, different; we hope it brings change. Our advertisers thrive on this value of the different. It’s new, it’s brighter! Our industries have long depended on our love for new models: 2022, just out! New! Our writers cannot plagiarize; our inventors must invent.
The Trobriander on the other hand expects and wants next year to be the same as this year. The new is not good; the old is known and valued. In repetition of experience he finds, not boredom, but satisfaction and safety. Members of our culture go into unchartered seas fearlessly. We explore new lands eagerly—mountain peaks, sea floors, inaccessible jungles and polar wastes. The Trobriander goes into known seas. He explores nothing. New lands, new thoughts, new ways, hold no interest for him. He was born into a culture that was operating long before he was born and will continue to operate long after he is dead.
Part 1: Multiple-choice questions — Choose the best answer and select one of A, B, C, or D
1. The Trobriand Islands are in:
a. the Pacific
b. the Caribbean
c. near New Guinea
d. Polynesia
2. The Trobriander values:
a. creativeness
b. the old and traditional
c. the new and the different
d. that which is useful
3. An art form in our society is valued for:
a. its position within a patterned activity
b. itself alone
c. its financial value
d. for many attributes, not all of which concern art
4. When we say, “The lightning flashed” we:
a. read action into the event
b. use an intransitive verb
c. describe the event as being without action
d. describe the event in the only possible way
5. The stone blades were:
a. used as inducement
b. equivalent to money
c. part of a patterned activity
d. gifts in payment for other gifts
6. English does not:
a. stress causality
b. differentiate between psychological and external experienees
e. emphasize time
d. employ a variety of adjectives
7. By lineality we mean:
a. patterned activities
b. emphasis upon being
c. connections, usually sequential, between things
d. the use of gestures
8. Our language and our culture structures experience so that it:
a. leads or should lead to a desired climax
b. emphasizes repetition and sameness
c. can be responded to
d. stands by itself, without reference to other experiences
9. In our language, much value is attached to:
a. changes in temporal sequences
b. essence of being
c. ability of emotional expression
d. change and becoming
10. We stress causality and lineality because:
a. we are interested in relationships
b. we are interested in being
c. our language and culture teaches us to value them
d. this is the most accurate way to describe reality
11. The Eskimo language is characterized by:
a. lack of nouns
b. lack of tenses
c. lack of transitive or action verbs
d. lack of categories differentiating living from non-living
12. The English language makes continual use of:
a. several tenses (simultaneously)
b. spatial metaphors
c. words describing subjective, psychological experiences
d. categories differentiating internal and external experiences
13. The Trobriand language emphasizes:
a. change and becoming
b. varied use of adjectives
c. temporal aspects of objects
d. being and existence
14. A noun in the Trobriand language refers to:
a. a highly unique object
b. being as a whole
c. an object at a particular stage of growth
d. useful objects only
15. Native languages differ from English because:
a. they cannot express causality
b. they are not fully evolved
c. they do not deal with temporality
d. they contain other metaphysical systems
16. In our culture, we tend to judge things in terms of:
a. intrinsic value
b. qualities and attributes
c. aesthetic satisfaction
d. relation to other beings
17. Disregard of chronological sequence is characteristic of:
a. all primitive languages
b. English language
c. the thinking of small children
d. Trobriand language
18. The implicit philosophy of English grammar makes us:
a. seek essence
b. ask “why”
c. value money
d. see lineality and being
19. In the lecture, an analogy was drawn between:
a. money and a Valentine
b. foreign trinkets and necklaces
c. stone blades and Valentines
d. armbands and Valentines
20. Gift exchange among the Trobrianders is significant because it:
a. stimulates barter
b. symbolizes kinship and friendship
c. involves gifts which influence behavior
d. is similar to Christmas-giving
Part 2: Short-answer questions — submit answers along with Part 1 in the same file
21. Quote a sentence from the lecture in which a definition is given (citing the page number for your quotation). Is your chosen example a real or nominal definition? If it is real, then is it logical, causal, or descriptive? If it is logical, then distinguish both the genus and the essential difference. If it is causal, then distinguish whether there are formal, final, material, or efficient causes involved. If it is descriptive, then state whether it uses a property or an accident. [Review: see Lessons 10–12]
22. Quote a sentence from the lecture in which a universal affirmative Type A proposition is given. Rewrite the proposition in your chosen example in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms. [Review: see Lessons 14–17]
23. For the Type A proposition in #22 above, state its contrary, its contradictory, and its subalternate (each in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms, and labelling each proposition Type as A, E, I, or O). [Review: see Lesson 18]
24. If we assume the Type A proposition in #22 above is FALSE, then state whether its contrary is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED; state whether its contradictory is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED; and state whether its subalternate is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED. [Review: see Lesson 18]
25. Quote a sentence from the lecture in which a universal negative Type E proposition is given. Rewrite the proposition in your chosen example in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms. [Review: see Lessons 14–17]
26. For the Type E proposition in #25 above, state: its contrary; its contradictory; and its subalternate (each in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms, and labelling each proposition Type as A, E, I, or O). [Review: see Lesson 18]
27. If we assume the Type E proposition in #25 above is FALSE, then state: whether its contrary is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED; state whether its contradictory is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED; and state whether its subalternate is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED. [Review: see Lesson 18]
28. Quote a sentence from the lecture in which a particular affirmative Type I proposition is given (citing the page number for your quotation). Rewrite the proposition in your chosen example in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms. [Review: see Lessons 14–17]
29. For the Type I proposition in #28 above, state: its subcontrary; its contradictory; and its subimplicate (each in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms, and labelling each proposition Type as A, E, I, or O). [Review: see Lesson 18]
30. If we assume the Type I proposition in #28 above is TRUE, then state: whether its subcontrary is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED; state whether its contradictory is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED; and state whether its subimplicate is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED. [Review: see Lesson 18]
31. Quote a sentence from the lecture in which a particular negative Type O proposition is given. Rewrite the proposition in your chosen example in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms. [Review: see Lessons 14–17]
32. For the Type O proposition in #31 above, state: its subcontrary; its contradictory; and its subimplicate (each in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms, and labelling each proposition Type as A, E, I, or O). [Review: see Lesson 18]
33. If we assume the Type O proposition in #31 above is TRUE, then state: whether its subcontrary is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED; state whether its contradictory is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED; and state whether its subimplicate is TRUE, FALSE, or UNDETERMINED. [Review: see Lesson 18]
34. Write the inverse of the proposition in #22 above. Show all the steps involved in the inference. Write all propositions in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms. [Review: see Lessons 19– 20]
35. Write the inverse of the proposition in #25 above. Show all the steps involved in the inference. Write all propositions in standard form, distinguishing the subject term from the predicate term by using single uppercase letters to define your terms. [Review: see Lessons 19– 20]
36. Quote a passage from the lecture in which you find a syllogism, an enthymeme, or an epicheirema. Choose only one argument type. Rewrite each proposition in your chosen example in standard form, distinguishing the conclusion’s subject term from the conclusion’s predicate term, as well as the middle term(s), by using single uppercase letters to define your terms, and labelling each proposition Type as A, E, I, or O. Use square brackets to enclose any unspoken premises assumed in enthymematic reasoning, if applicable. [Review: see Lessons 24–28]
37. Analyze the argument in #36 above by checking it for validity and then stating whether it is VALID or INVALID. Prove your answer by drawing a Venn diagram for the argument, labeling it according to your analysis in #36 above. If the argument is INVALID, state each one of the four rules which the argument violates. If the argument is VALID, state whether or not it is SOUND, and why. [Review: see Lessons 25–27]
38. Quote another passage from the lecture (different from your example in #36) in which you find a syllogism, an enthymeme, or an epicheirema. Choose only one. Rewrite each proposition in your chosen example in standard form, distinguishing the conclusion’s subject term from the conclusion’s predicate term, as well as the middle term(s), by using single uppercase letters to define your terms, and labelling each proposition Type as A, E, I, or O. Use square brackets to enclose any unspoken premises assumed in enthymematic reasoning, if applicable. If you wish, instead of citing another passage, you can paraphrase what you discern the main argument of the entire lecture to be, by stating your interpretation as a syllogism, enthymeme, or epicheirema, and then formalizing that argument according to the preceding symbolization instructions for #38. [Review: see Lessons 24–28]
39. Analyze the argument in #38 above by checking it for validity and then stating whether it is VALID or INVALID. Prove your answer by drawing a Venn diagram for the argument, labeling it according to your analysis in #38 above. If the argument is INVALID, state each one of the four rules which the argument violates. If the argument is VALID, state whether or not it is SOUND, and why. [Review: see Lessons 25–27]
Answer #41 writing a very short essay in response. Use a PDF for #42.
41. The lecturer described two native philosophies, but at the same time said that the Eskimo, for example, had no philosophers. How would you interpret these two statements in terms of the lecture? Write 250-300 words. Refer to other sources and thinkers only if you need to for explaining your own argument.
42. Create a work of art indicating how you feel about the lecture. Submit a title to your artwork.
