# Lack of a "semantics" forum.



## Michael Zwingli

I suppose semantic questions might be asked under the individual language forums, but has the creation of a "Semantics" Forum ever been considered?


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## elroy

What kinds of questions would you want to ask in such a forum?


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## duduc

elroy said:


> What kinds of questions would you want to ask in such a forum?


A few examples:

Whether or not sentences such as 'it's raining' necessarily have a hidden indexical referring to a place --- as if there were an implicit 'here' or 'there' somewhere --- and, if they do, whether this analysis bears out across all natural languages.
Whether the meaning of indexicals are (i) the very thing referred to, or (ii) the conceptual criteria used to find out the thing referred to.
How anaphora works.
Whether adverbs ('slowly') attach to individual verbs or whole clauses.
Whether prepositions ('of', 'from') have meanings in themselves or else are inherently meaningless (syncategorematic).
Are natural kind terms (lion) quantified or referential expressions: are their meanings the very things that fall under them (all lions that ever existed taken separately or as an extensional class) or some abstract entity (say, lionhood or the _Panthera leo_ species)?
Whether definite descriptions ('the lead vocalist of my favorite band') are quantified or referential expressions: is it about a specific individual, or is it about whoever happens to be the lead vocalist of my favorite band, that is, about a bound variable?
Whether proper names in natural languages are referential expressions or not: for instance, does 'Thom Yorke is a pretty good singer' mean something like 'the lead vocalist of my favorite band is a pretty good singer'?
Whether a strictly semiotic theory of meaning makes any sense: that is, whether the semantic content of a sentence can ever be fully encoded in a particular string of words, or else whether some degree of pragmatic enrichment is needed to account for the meaning of some, most or even all sentences of a language.
Whether natural languages can have an infinite amount of building blocks and still be learnable.
Whether the idea of a language of thought makes any sense.
What is the relation between meaning and truth: can truth conditions fully express the meaning of sentences?
What is the semantics of fiction? How can fictional sentences in a romance be possibly true, if at all? What exactly does 'Anna Karenina' refer to?
I like @Michael Zwingli's suggestion.


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## elroy

All of those questions can be accommodated in our Etymology, History of languages, and Linguistics (EHL) forum.


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## duduc

elroy said:


> All of those questions can be accommodated in our Etymology, History of languages, and Linguistics (EHL) forum.


Why didn't you say so before?


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## elroy

I didn’t know what kinds of questions the OP was interested in.  I still don’t, since you answered for him.


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## duduc

elroy said:


> I still don’t, since you answered for him.


I apologize.


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## elroy

No need to apologize! 

I hope you ask your questions in EHL.


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## Michael Zwingli

duduc said:


> I apologize.



Sorry about this tardy reply. I have been quite absorbed with a few matters, and have not have the coincidence of free time and rememberance to jump on and check this.



elroy said:


> What kinds of questions would you want to ask in such a forum?



Specifically, questions dealing with semantic issues that are conceptual, ideational, or metaphysical. This refers to questions which are not lexically dependent, which is to say questions not dependent upon any lexemes in particular, or upon the lexicon of any particular language, and so applicaple to any language or all languages. Semantics, unlike Etymology, is a highly abstract and conceptual sub-field within linguistics. Etymology, pertaining to the development of lexemes from linguistic roots, does indeed involve semantics in the consideration of why particular lexemes may have subsumed a certain meaning or set of meanings. Semantics differs from this in considering meanings in and of themselves, and how different meanings relate to one another apart from any lemmas which may have come to represent them. That is to say: the primary objects of etymology are lemmas (or lexemes), with meanings being a secondary consideration; the primary objects of semantics are meanings, with lemmas, their development (etymology), and their both intra-lingual as well as inter- (cross-) lingual comparison (comparative etymology), all being secondary considerations. In this way, questions which are bound by lexical etymology are not pure semantic questions. However, lexicographic issues will often begin semantic questions, because of the often contrasting meanings which lexemes can comprise. I hope that I am relating this clearly...

It is because of the difficulty associated with the abstraction and conceptualization of semantics, that I think a semantics forum might be warranted. How much it might be used by the general Word Reference member is another issue, though.


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## elroy

As its name indicates, Etymology, History of languages, and Linguistics (EHL) forum is not limited to etymology.  The last part of the name, "Linguistics," includes semantics, so please feel free to ask your semantics questions in the EHL forum.


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