Showing papers on "Connotation published in 1975"

On Predicating Proper Names

Abstract: M ILL'S System of Logic is not often turned to by contemporary philosophers as a source of insights regarding the philosophy of language. To be sure, the terms "connotation" and "denotation," which Mill coined, have passed into quite general circulation; and Mill's doctrine of proper names has recently regained a certain popularity largely as a result of the writings of Kripke. But the notions of connotation and denotation seem generally to be understood in the context of a Fregean or Carnapian scheme of thought which is, to a large extent, alien to Mill's own way of conceiving language; and Mill's views on proper names are usually discussed entirely without reference to what, for Mill, constitutes their theoretical rationale. To some, it may come as a surprise to learn that Mill actually had anything amounting to a theory of language. In fact, however, there is to be gleaned from Mill's Logic a theory of quite considerable sophistication which I shall attempt, in part, to reconstruct and defend. What will emerge from our discussion is a conception of proper names which combines elements that might seem, at first blush, incompatible with one another. I shall argue that the Kripke-Donnellan conception of proper names as "rigid designators" or purely referential devices is anticipated by Mill to an even greater degree than is generally recognized; but that, curiously, this conception does not prevent Mill from allowing that proper names can function as genuine predicates. We shall find that, even for Mill, there is, after all, a sense in which proper names might be said to connote.

Family and leisure: a set of contradictions

Abstract: If a person "dreams" of leisure, he discovers connotations that are shared by so many people that we can begin to postulate a cultural definition of leisure in our western civilization. For many, it means stretching out for sun in a combination of well-being and laziness. Leisure is supposed to "feel good," whether outside on a beach or inside in a comfortable home. For more active persons, it may mean using muscles for pleasure or skills for creativity. In other words, if we did a semantic analysis of the context in which the word leisure is used, we would find at least two general dimensions. First, the activity is pleasurable for the individual. Second, it is done at a time when the person is free to do it. The latent meaning of leisure for most people is that you do a thing that you want to do, at your own pace. Leisure is thus defined connotatively in individual terms. However, we know that leisure activities are more often than not pursued in a group setting. If we add the qualification "family" to the word leisure we get the added connotation of "doing things together. " This togetherness is highly valued in family ideology and a postulate that is seldom explicated is that a high rate of family interaction in a leisure context will bring more cohesion to the group as an entity. That a high rate of family cohesion is desirable is also part of our western ideology. I It will be our contention in this article that cohesion is but one of many desirable states of the family system. The fact that leisure activity has the connotation of individuality in our culture is reflected in the type of research that has generated existing data. It considers the individual as the unit of analysis, and it focuses mostly on attitudes instead of actual behavior. Furthermore, and this is a corrolary of the above, leisure activities are seldom considered in their total impact on a specific society and in the social class as of that society. Research seldom looks into the social determinants of leisure, either as a product of social class or as specific to a particular type of society according to level of affluence. Our reasoning in this article will be guided by a systemic approach. Among other things, this means that the family system, as a system, has developed rules of behavior that will generally apply to leisure activity as well as to any other family activity. These rules are family norms (a culture specific to each family) and they will be applied to transform inputs from the environment. Following Ackoffs (1972) definition of a purposeful system, we say that an activity is co-producted by the rules of the systemn and the input from the environment. What is being done, (as family behavior in this article), depends on the perceived alternatives for choice within the family system, in order to match adequately the variety of

Transnational Corporations and Third World Agriculture

Abstract: I prefer to use the term ‘transnational’ because it indicates the tendency of the corporations to cross national frontiers with a minimum of difficulty, whereas the connotation ‘multinational’ may suggest a kind of common ownership which actually does not exist. This article has been published in Rapport, the periodical of the Swedish International Development Authority (no. 2, 1975).