Living Words: Meaning Underdetermination and the Dynamic Lexicon

by Peter Ludlow

Peter Ludlow shows how word meanings are much more dynamic than we might have supposed, and explores how meanings are modulated (changed) even during the course of our everyday conversations. When we engage with communicative partners we build micro-languages on the fly--languages that may be fleeting, but which serve our joint interests. Sometimes we sync up on word meanings without reflection, but in many cases we debate the proper modulation of the meanings of our words. Living Words explores the norms that govern the ways in which we litigate word meanings. The resulting view is radical, and Ludlow shows that it has far-reaching consequences for our political and legal discourse and also for some of the deepest and most intractable puzzles that have gripped English-language philosophy for the past 100 years--including puzzles in the foundations of semantics, epistemology, and logic.

Genres: Philosophy

204 pages, Hardcover

First published May 8, 2014

Reviews

[Galatea · Rating 3 out of 5]

After reading this on and off for weeks now, I've decided to essentially skim through the last 30 pages after having trouble slogging through the last two chapters.

The main premise of this book, that words are underdetermined, and that we use language as a whole to create "microlanguages" that suit the purposes of whatever conversation we're having on the fly, is very interesting, but as someone reading philosophy without any formal training, the more dense, technical parts later in the end lost me, which was a shame, since the topic was legitimately interesting.

Ah well, I suppose I'll just reread this when I'm older and wiser.

[danielle; ▵ · Rating 2 out of 5]

an annoying book that says little

[MEMYSELFI · Rating 4 out of 5]

Beginning is cute, the philosophy in the latter half is serious but completely wrong. If Ludlow sees this, I want him to know that when I say its wrong, I mean in this microlanguage that its right. Maybe I mean that it's a cucumber. (Also I'll provide an argument for my 'modulation', blah blah blah, there's my argument. I argue that it is perfectly robust.) If you hold a position like Ludlow's, you might as well be skeptic about meaning.

[Mari · Rating 3 out of 5]

I feel like this book had an identity crisis of who it was meant for. The first few chapters were an easy read, even for those who don't have a background in linguistics. The last few chapters, however, were quite difficult to understand. I think overall Ludlow made some interesting arguments which I'm inclined to agree with.

[Daniel Song · Rating 3 out of 5]

Trivial and unoriginal

[Nat]

Super suggestive. I particularly like the idea of "lexical warfare" introduced in the early chapters, though I think I'm inclined to be interested in anything with "warfare" in its name. I did immediately notice a meta-linguistic dispute of the kind that Ludlow thinks is pervasive on thefirearmblog.com, concerning whether the terms/concepts "battle rifle"/"assault rifle" have any legitimate use, or whether they're both just types of automatic rifles ("assault rife" typically picks out rifles with smaller caliber rounds, and "battle rifle" usually picks out larger rounds (7.62mm, e.g)):

http://www.thefirearmblog.com/blog/20...