431. How words do things

Here I discuss how language enables and constrains action, using Aristotle’s multiple causality of action, used several times before in this blog (items 96-100, 289), in application to history, role models, science and policy, and virtues. These are collected in a bundle, available on my website bartnooteboom.nl.

Wittgenstein said that if you want to know the meaning of a word, see how it is used. And what affects its use.  

As proposed in his theory of speech acts (in the classic ‘How to do things with words’), J.L. Austin showed how words can be used not only to express things, or refer to things, but also to create or affect action, in illocution, addressing people.

One example is the verdict of a judge. Another is to give orders, to blame, or to express emotion.

Here I want to develop that a bit further with the use of Aristotle’s multiple causality of action, with the causalities of actors (‘efficient’ cause), intention, material, form (method, knowledge, technology), conditions (enabling, constraining), and ‘exemplars’, models (for guidance, imitation).

Rules and use of language affect who is given the opportunity to speak (efficient cause), affect intentions, give information for action as a material cause, knowledge as a formal cause, the conditions for discussion or dialogue, and give examples of excellent language use.  

Taking action, leading a meeting, in ‘giving someone the floor’, determining who can speak and when, sets the efficient cause. Ordering, as in the army or in any hierarchy, the pursuit of self-interest or some ideal set intentions. Teaching is provision of forms of action, with knowledge, skill, technology. News, education, or funds yield material for thought and action. Stating and implementing law, infrastructure, and communication constitute a conditional cause. Stories of exemplary behaviour, role models, heroes provide an exemplary cause.

In administering law, legal rules and precedent are the conditional and formal causes. Jurisprudence is a material cause. Justice is a final cause. The political setting is a conditional cause, hopefully in a separation of powers, with an independent judiciary.

In political debate, news is a material cause, rhetoric a formal cause, rules of debate a conditional cause, iconic leaders the exemplary cause.

In scientific debate experimental results are a material cause, logic, knowledge, theories, and terminology a formal cause, truth a final cause (one hopes), conferences and publications a conditional cause.

In poetry, rules of rhyme and metre are a formal cause.

Conditional causes enable and constrain the use of language, with rules of grammar, syntax, and pronunciation. These are provided in institutions of schools, libraries, dictionaries, media, etc.

The sentence forms the conditional cause for the words in it, eliciting and constraining their meanings. Words form the material cause in composing a sentence, with sentence meaning being a function of word meaning. Thus there is both ‘upward causation’ from words to sentences and ‘downward causation’ from sentences to words.

Sometimes, to get something done, words are not used but ostentation, demonstrating action, with a role model showing how to do things, as in master-apprentice relations, in carpentry, say. That happens, in particular when the knowledge involved is tacit know-how, difficult or impossible to codify. That may, however, be complemented by written instructions, in a manual or handbook.

Here, language and bodily expression go together, and that happens more widely, when linguistic expression is supported by facial expression and bodily moves to support the causal action of language, e.g. in affecting intentions, giving orders, enunciating a judgement, or underscoring a joke.