Duke University Press, Philosophical Review The Philosophical Review

Philosophical Review
Meaning and Communication

Author(s): D. M. Armstrong
Source: The Philosophical Review, Vol. 80, No. 4 (Oct., 1971), pp. 427-447
Published by: Duke University Press on behalf of Philosophical Review
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2183752
Accessed: 21-06-2016 11:34 UTC
REFERENCES
Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2183752?seq=1&cid=pdf-reference#references_tab_contents
You may need to log in to JSTOR to access the linked references.
Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
http://about.jstor.org/terms
JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted
digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about
JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.
Duke University Press, Philosophical Review are collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and
extend access to The Philosophical Review
This content downloaded from 128.135.12.127 on Tue, 21 Jun 2016 11:34:30 UTC
All use subject to http://about.jstor.org/terms
MEANING AND COMMUNICATION
O NE of the great uses of language is to communicate. Some

philosophers, notably John Locke, have seen this use of
language as the clue to an analysis of the notion of linguistic
meaning. Locke's analysis does not go very far and it contains
definite mistakes. But I think its central contention may be
correct. In this paper I try to develop further Locke's theory.
In the Essay, Book III, Chapters i and 2, Locke paints a
picture somewhat as follows. I have certain thoughts, beliefs,
desires, intentions, and so on. I wish you to know that I have
these thoughts, beliefs, and so forth, but, unfortunately, there is
no way that I can get you to perceive directly what is on my mind.
I therefore have recourse to a device. I utter sounds or issue
inscriptions. These function as signs to my intended audience
from which they are able to infer the content of my mind that I
want inferred. And thus my object is fulfilled. By itself, this is
just an analysis of linguistic communication. But Locke thinks
further that there is the closest connection-perhaps he even
thought that there was an identity-between what my sounds or
inscriptions signify to another (or to myself at another time) in
the communication situation, and what these sounds or inscrip-
tions mean.
The first thing to be noticed about Locke's theory is that it
demands a clear ontological distinction between mental states
on the one hand and their linguistic manifestation on the other.
Locke took this for granted; Behaviorists would not. But the tide
of behaviorism has now receded and so here I will follow Locke
and take the point for granted. There appears to be a positive
feedback process operating between thought and language, such
that once thought has been linguistically expressed the expressions
can be perceived and react back upon the mind, eventually
creating more complex and sophisticated thought which in turn
can be given linguistic expression. And so speech gives birth to
thought. It seems also to be at least a fact of nature, and may even
be a logical necessity, that certain thoughts can be manifested
427
D. M. ARMSTRONG
in linguistic behavior only. But both these propositions are com-

patible with the "distinct existence" in every case of mental
states and the linguistic behavior in which they may be mani-
fested.
We must now take notice of Locke's major error. Locke calls
Book III of his Essay, the book in which his views on language
are developed, "On Words," and he develops his theory in terms
of words, not sentences. Words are said to be signs of "ideas" in
the mind of the utterer of the word. But if we want to develop a
theory of meaning in terms of communication, must we not
concentrate on the meanings of sentences rather than words? It
somebody utters a mere part of a sentence, as a word usually is,
what does that communicate? In general, very little. Suppose I
just say, "Horse." Has anything much been communicated? In
general, a complete sentence is needed to get something across.
The unit of communication is the sentence. And so a theory of meaning
that is based on the communicative function of language must
treat the sentence as in some way semantically fundamental. An
account of word meaning will have to be given in terms of the
contribution of words to the meaning of sentences. This paper will
not get very far beyond the meaning of sentences.
It is worth noticing that there could be a language, or at least
a system of communication, that had sentences but lacked any
words or other semantic subunits. The language would contain a
finite number of symbols, each symbol having as its meaning some
complete message, such as obtains with one of the flag languages
used by ships. (A yellow flag: yellow fever aboard; the Blue Peter:
I am leaving port in 24 hours; and so forth.) But, unlike the
flag language of ships, there might be no translations into analyzed
sentences available. (If you are worried how such a language
could be introduced, postulate an innate mechanism.) Such a
language, if we consent to call it such, will have a semantics but
no syntax. So it will exhibit semantic problems in a primitive
but particularly pure state.
We communicate, then, by uttering sentences that are signs
of what is on our mind. What is meant by the word "sign" here?
Locke does not tell us, although his general account gives some
hints. At this point we encounter one of the road blocks that have
428
turned back many thinkers looking for an account of linguistic

meaning. We speak of natural phenomena-for instance, the
traditional black clouds-as signs. But can utterances be signs in
the sense that black clouds are signs? A natural first reaction is
"Surely not; utterances are linguistic signs. The special mark of a
linguistic sign is that it signifies in virtue of meaning. So it is im-
possible to elucidate meaning in terms of the utterance's role as a
sign."
My hypothesis is that utterances of sentences in the communi-
cation situation are signs in exactly the same sense of the word
"sign" that black clouds are a sign of rain.' I will not be arguing
that what an utterance signifies in this sense can be identified with
the linguistic meaning of the utterance. That is too crude a view.
But an analysis of linguistic meaning will be given in terms of
this basic, black cloud, sense of "signify." I think that such a
view is true at least to the spirit of Locke's analysis.
What do we mean when we say that black clouds are a sign
of rain? It is tempting to say that the necessary and sufficient
condition is a very simple one: there must be some true inductive
generalization linking the occurrence of black clouds with the
high probability of the occurrence of rain in some relation to the
clouds.
A sign may function as a sign. A man may perceive, or other-
wise come to learn, that black clouds are massing on a certain
occasion. If he infers from this that, in all probability, rain will
follow, then he has read the sign correctly. It functioned as a
sign for him. But there is no need that a sign function as a sign.
There are signs that nobody reads, and there are signs that
nobody can read. ("We think it is a sign of something. But what
it is a sign of we do not know.")
Like the sign, the thing signified is always a particular state of
affairs. It is semantically wrong to say, "This phenomenon is a
sign that the law of gravitation holds." The correct thing to say
is "This phenomenon is evidence that the law of gravitation holds."
1 I am here in argeement with the theoretical linguist Dr. Pieter Seuren.

Although Seuren is dubious about the link I postulate between meaning and
communication, this paper owes much to discussions with him.
429
D. M. ARMSTRONG
Unfortunately, however, there are counterinstances to this

simple definition of "sign." A certain sort of wound might almost
invariably cause the death of the wounded man. A physician who
observed such a wound might infer the likelihood of swift death.
But we would not want to say that the wound was a sign of
approaching death. Contrast this with the case where a certain
sort of pallor of countenance occurs only shortly before death.
We would say that the pallor was a sign of approaching death.
What is the distinction between the wound and the pallor? We
have stipulated that that sort of wound causes death, but it is
natural to suppose that pallor, of whatever sort, is not a cause of
death. Should we therefore say that a sign is never a cause of the
thing signified? This is not quite correct, because the black clouds
could be said to be the cause of rain. The blackness of the clouds,
however, is not thought to have anything to do with bringing
about rain. So we need to qualify our original definition of a
sign by saying that the characteristics of a sign that make it a
sign cannot be causally responsible for the characteristics of the
thing signified that make it the thing signified by that sign. I may
add that the qualification is of no further importance to the argu-
ment of this paper. But notice, what is important, that the thing
signified can very well be the cause of the sign, and the cause in
respect of the characteristics that make the thing signified the
thing signified, and the sign the sign. The stab-wound in the corpse
is a sign of foul play.
Utterances, then, are to be signs in the same sense that black
clouds are a sign of rain, but, following Locke, utterances are
to be signs of some state of affairs in the speaker's mind. But at
this point another road block looms up. The meanings of utterances
cannot, in general at least, be mental states of the utterer. If in a
normal social and linguistic context I utter the sentence, "Jack
won't be coming," then the meaning of this is that Jack won't be
coming. This is certainly not a mental state of the utterer of the
utterance.
So if a Lockean type of analysis is to go through it must be
accepted that what a certain utterance signifies in the sense
stipulated, and what it means, are two different things. (By the
way, there are some indications that Locke saw, or half saw,
43O
this point although his language remains atrociously ambiguous.)

And at this point it is easy to abandon the attempt to give an
account of the meaning of utterances in terms of the mental states
they signify. Such despair is in fact, however, quite premature.
For might not the utterance's meaning be a function of what the
utterance signifies in the precise sense that /x is a function of x,
or x is a function of V/x? Given that the thing signified is such and
such, could there not be an operation performed upon the propo-
sition that says what is signified so that "the meaning" is derived
from that proposition in some fixed manner?
Consider, for instance, what I shall shortly argue to be a too
simple suggestion. Suppose that my utterance, "Jack won't be
coming," is a more or less reliable sign that I believe that Jack
won't be coming. The meaning could then be derived from the
thing signified by restricting ourselves to what I believe, the
intentional object of my belief-namely, that Jack won't be
coming. Which yields us the result that we want. "Meanings"
of utterances are then mere abstractions from the "thing signified"
by the utterance, and are defined in terms of the thing signified.
Thus encouraged, let us askjust what mental states of the utterer
utterances are signs of. If we take an assertion like "Jack won't be
coming," then, as philosophers well know, there is some cornec-
tion between assertion and the assertor's believing what is asserted.
It is well known that "p, but I don't believe p" is the form of a
paradoxical utterance (a topic to which we will return shortly).
So it is a natural first suggestion to investigate that an utterance
that is an assertion that p is a sign that the utterer believes that p.
Similar suggestions can be made for other types of utterance.
If I make the request to somebody, "Pass the salt," then the mean-
ing of my utterance is, presumably, that the person addressed should
pass the salt. But the utterance will be a sign that the utterer has
the objective that the person addressed should pass the salt. The
meaning is restricted to what the objective of the utterer is. Similar
analyses, perhaps, can be given for other sorts of utterance.
The suggestion that assertions that p are signs (although they
do not mean) that the utterer believes that p obviously has some-
thing to recommend it. Such utterances are very often accom-
panied by the corresponding belief. But there is one obvious
43I
D. M. ARMSTRONG
source of unreliability. The speaker may be insincere. He may be

speaking "contra mentem." Such insincerity is not confined to
assertions (lying), but may be involved in almost every sort of
speech act. (As an example of an insincere command consider the
following case. I have been myself commanded to say "Get out"
to you, and I dare not disobey, so I issue the order. But never-
theless I hope that you will disobey. My command to you is insin-
cere.) There is a small class of speech acts, including the naming
of people and things, and perhaps formal greetings, where insin-
cerity is not possible. I think that they are relatively peripheral
cases of the use of language, but in any case the theses of this paper
will not apply to such speech acts. (There is another class of
linguistic acts, such as telling fairy stories, where insincerity is
not possible either. But it will be argued at the end of this paper
that they are cases of mock communication.)
Returning to utterances of the sort that permit insincerity, we
can find mental states of the utterer that are signified by the utter-
ance with higher reliability than the mental states so far consid-
ered. Instead of saying that the utterance "Jack won't be coming"
is a sign that the speaker believes that Jack won't be coming, say
instead that it is a sign that:
(the speaker has the objectives that an audience should have

reason to believe {that the speaker believes [that Jack won't
be coming]}).
Similarly, the utterance "Pass the salt" is a sign that:
(the speaker has the objective that an audience should have

reason to believe {that the speaker's objective is [that the
person addressed should pass the salt]}).
2 I use the word "objective" and not the word "intention," the word that a
student of Grice's work might expect here, because I think the notion of
having an intention is a narrower notion than that of having an objective, and
too narrow a notion for an analysis of the notion of linguistic meaning. In
particular, I think that expression of intentions entails that the speaker believes
that the thing aimed at is within his power, an entailment that is absent in the
expression of mere objectives. And it is obvious that not all attempts at
linguistic communication are confident attempts.
432
Given a causal theory of the will, which I assume in this paper

although I cannot argue for it here, the inference is one from a
phenomenon to its cause.
The influence of H.P. Grice will be evident, although there
are important differences from Grice's formulae. Notice that
the first part of the formula is exactly the same for assertions and
for requests. I think that this exact similarity holds for every sort
of speech act of the sort that permits insincerity. Now, given this
amended account of what is signified, there is a very reliable
inductive inference from the particular utterance to a mental
state of the utterer of this rather complex sort. (Exceptions will
be discussed later.)
An analysis of linguistic communication may have value even
if I am wrong in postulating a peculiar link between communi-
cation and meaning. So before pressing on with the topic of
meaning, let us spell out the picture of linguistic communication
at which we have arrived. A, let us say, utters the phonemes that
encode the sentence "There is yellow fever aboard." B hears
the phonemes. B infers (just as one infers from any sign) that A
made this utterance with the object that an audience should have
reason to believe {that A believes (that there is yellow fever
aboard)}. If B believes further that A is no deliberate deceiver or
joker, then he will further infer that A believes that there is yellow
fever aboard. If B believes still further that A is reliable in beliefs
such as this, he will infer that there is indeed yellow fever aboard.
And if he gets this far, he may take some appropriate action. The
situation is even more complicated for A whose plan (we may
assume) is that B should go through this process of inference and
then, as a result, take appropriate action.
If all this seems too complicated, notice that it need not,
usually will not, take place at an explicit and self-conscious
mental level. And it may even be that some of the steps of the
inference get missed out in accordance with the following model.
Suppose that I believe that all A's are B's except the rather small
proportion of A's that are C's. I believe that A's that are C's are
not B's. Now if I see an A, then, in general, this sight makes me
infer straightaway that it is a B. I do not proceed by noticing it is
an A and not a C and then concluding it is a B. I jump straight
433
D. M. ARMSTRONG
from the sight of A to the belief that it is a B. If, however, I

perceive both that it is an A and that it is a C, then my customary
inference is inhibited. Applying this model to the communication
situation, an audience may well credit a man with believing what
he is saying, and with being reliable in his beliefs, unless special
conditions are present that make the audience think the speaker
is insincere or unreliable. And so in some cases our complicated
scheme of inference for the audience may be rational reconstruc-
tion rather than psychological reality.
Manfred von Thun has pointed out to me that, if this analysis
of communication is correct, interesting light is thrown on the
paradoxical utterance "p, but I don't believe p."
Notice first that "p, but I don't believe p" is ambiguous.
Writing s for the speaker and using B as the belief-operator we
have either "p & Bsp" or "p & Bs P.I
Taking the case of "p & Bsp" first, consider an audience,
A, who hears a sentence of this form. A believes (that the speaker
has the objective that an audience should believe {that the
speaker believes [p & Bsp]}). Call the proposition between
parentheses "Audience's Proposition i." If A grants the speaker
sincerity then A progresses to the belief {that the speaker believes
[p & ra Bsp]}. Call this "Audience's Proposition 2." It can be
symbolized as Bs (p & Bsp). Now if somebody believes
the conjunction of two propositions, then it is entailed that he
believes each of the conjuncts. (The reverse entailment does not
hold because it is possible to hold beliefs simultaneously but fail
to "bring them together.") So Audience's proposition 2 entails
Bsp & Bs Bsp. Call these conjuncts "Audience's Proposition
2a & 2b," respectively. Now return to Audience's Proposition 2
Bs (p & Bsp). Supposing that the audience were to grant the
speaker reliability, the audience would progress to "Audience's
Proposition 3" which is the conjunction of p & Bsp. Call the
conjuncts 3a and 3b. But now the difficulty is revealed: 3b is the
contradictory of 2a. So a rational audience cannot grant the
speaker reliability. Nor can a rational speaker expect that the
audience will grant him reliability. Hence the utterance will
seem paradoxical to speakers and hearers.
The situation is similar, but not quite the same, if what the
434
speaker says is something of the form "p & Bs ' p." Given the
usual inferences on the part of the audience, 31/ will be Bs p
while 2a' will be Bsp. So a rational audience can grant the speaker
sincerity and reliability only on condition that the speaker holds
contradictory beliefs simultaneously. And a rational speaker will
perceive this. Hence the utterance will seem paradoxical to
speakers and hearers.
Getting back to the topic of meaning, the interesting point
in this analysis is that if B makes the very first inference-namely,
the very complex one-then linguistic communication, at least,
has been achieved. As J. L. Austin would say, uptake has been
secured. An illocutionary act has occurred. B has understood A's
words. B may think A a liar or, even if not a liar, so idiotic that
he is not to be taken seriously. But B has understood A's words.
Which suggests that meaning can plausibly be seen as a function
of what is inferred at that first level.
We are now in a position to distinguish three levels: what the
utterance "signifies," what the utterance "expresses," and what
the utterance means. It has often been said that the assertion "p"
expresses the speaker's belief that p and means that p. Or, again,
that "Pass the salt" expresses the speaker's desire that the person
addressed should pass the salt and means that the person addressed
should pass the salt.
(The speaker has the objective that an audience should have

reason to believe3
{that the speaker believes [that Jack won't be coming]}
or {that the speaker's objective is [that the person addressed
should pass the salt]}.)
(i) The utterance is a sign that a situation of this complex sort
exists. The situation is therefore the thing signified.
8 It is not necessary that there should actually be an audience, or even that

the speaker should definitely believe that there is an audience. The speaker
may not care whether there is an audience or not, although clearly he cannot
believe that there definitely is no audience. Again, although the utterance
gives an audience, if it exists, "reason to believe," it is possible that the audience
already believes what it has been given reason to believe, and that the speaker
believes that the audience believes this. We can be given reason to believe
what we believe already, even when it is believed we believe it already.
435
D. M. ARMSTRONG
(2) The utterance may be said to express whatever it is that

the speaker wants the audience to have reason to believe. (The
sentences within braces have as their meaning what the utterance
is said to express.) What is expressed will always be some mental
state of the speaker, but if the speaker is insincere no such mental
state will exist. What is expressed is therefore an intentional object.
(3) What is expressed will itself always have an intentional
object. This intentional object is the meaning of the utterance.
(The sentences within brackets have as their meaning the meaning
of the utterance.)
So meaning is not identical with significance, but it is analyzed
in terms of significance. ("Significance" here, of course, has be-
come a technical term meaning "what is signified" by a sign.
In ordinary speech it can mean "meaning.") Ordinary thought
and speech concentrate upon the meaning rather than the signif-
icance of an utterance for the obvious reason that "meaning" is
the completely changeable element in the significance and there-
fore of the most interest.
My thesis is now stated. I now consider a series of objections,
some of which require to be met by minor qualifications and
modifications.
First, it may be asked how the original inference is made from
the utterance by an auditor. He infers from a mere medley of
noises to a very complex mental state of the utterer. How does
he do this? Surely, it will be objected, he can do it only because
he knows the conventional rules of meaning for that language. So
whatever light we may or may not have cast upon linguistic
communication, our rigmarole of inference presupposes, and so
cannot assist in the analysis of, the notion of the meaning of an
utterance.
My answer to this (fundamental) objection is that the inference
does not derive its warrant from the rules of meaning but rather
that "the rules of meaning" are just reflections of the fact that,
in this linguistic community, from these signs this inference is to
be made. Here we need to see the irrelevance of the notion of
convention to the logical analysis of the notion of linguistic
meaning. The notion of a convention, whether explicit or tacit,
is an exceedingly complex one, as David Lewis has recently
436
shown. 4 But is it not a mere contingent fact that linguistic meanings

are conventional? Chomsky holds, as an empirical if high-level
hypothesis, that the fundamental principles of grammar are
innate and not conventional. But is it not conceivable that the
whole of syntax and semantics should have been innate so that all
mankind naturally spoke the one, wired-in, nonconventional
language?
The important thing for us to consider is what effect establishing
a convention has. And the characteristic intended effect of
establishing a convention is to produce something that could
conceivably have been produced by other means: a certain
regularity in human affairs. (It may be an empirical fact that the
regularity cannot be produced except by establishing a con-
vention.) Consider driving on a particular side of the road. It is
an arbitrary matter, to be decided at the beginning by mere
choice, which side of the road we drive upon. But once the deci-
sion has been made and promulgated, it introduces a new regularity
in human affairs (not, of course, an absolute regularity). The
regularity is maintained in part by social pressure, but it exists and,
as a result, inferences can be made and practical decisions arrived
at that count on the cars on one side of the road going in the one
direction almost always. Now, in the same way, a rule of meaning
may be established and maintained by a convention, explicit or
tacit. But what is established and maintained is simply a certain
regularity in human affairs (not an absolute regularity): namely,
that the speaker says "p" only where the utterance is brought into
existence as the result of a certain complex mental state of the
utterer.5 And so the audience can make a more or less reliable
inference from "p" to that state.
Second, it may be objected that this account will serve only
4 Convention (Cambridge, Mass., i969).

5 Here we must, of course, acknowledge the point insisted upon by Chomsky:
that a great proportion of the sentences uttered have never been uttered before
and may never be uttered again. The real regularities are the syntactic and
semantic rules from which the "significance" and so the meaning of the
utterancefollows. These rules relate to semantic parts of utterances. But I do not
think that this contradicts the contention that the meanings of complete
utterances are, in another way, the units of meaning. For the rules state the
particular contribution that such semantic parts make to complete sentences.
437
D. M. ARMSTRONG
where a man uses language in an orthodox way. But suppose he

uses words in an unusual way? Suppose he says, "It's hot in here"
meaning by this what we would mean by "It's cold in here"?
(And let us rule out irony. An ironic tone of voice, or a contextual
indicator of irony, is equivalent to an operation that changes the
meaning of the sentence in some systematic way. In our sentence
it is equivalent to putting "the very opposite of" in front of "hot."
Incidentally, this account of irony may be a starting point for the
far more complex task of giving an account of metaphorical
meaning.) The simplest case is that where the speaker is mistaken
about meanings, but I think we could even have the case where
he has just decided, out of sheer bloody-mindedness, to change his
usage (pace Wittgenstein). Where is the regularity here? And if
there is no regularity, how can it be said that his utterance is a
sign of what is on his mind?
Nevertheless, I think it can be argued that the utterance is
still a sign. The first point to be made is that the same sort of
sign can have different significance in different contexts. It is
intelligible to say, "Black clouds are a sign of rain, but not when
they occur in a particular sort of meteorological situation."
One could, of course, insist that in such cases the thing that was
the sign was not really "black clouds" but "black clouds in this
sort of meteorological situation" and thus avoid admitting that we
really were dealing with generically the same sign. But ordinary
usage seems to permit talking of "the same sign "here. The second,
and vital, point is that where a cause has an effect, then there
will be characteristics of the effect (including perhaps the context
in which it is set) from which the nature of the cause can be
inductively inferred by somebody with sufficient knowledge of the
lawlike connections in nature. The fact that nobody can read
such a sign will not make it any less a sign.
Suppose, then, that a man makes any utterance whatsoever.
If the speaker has the objective that an audience should have
reason to believe that (say) the speaker believes that Jack won't
be coming, then the utterance is an effect of, it is brought into
existence by, this complex conative state of the speaker's.6 It will
6 Notice, again, that I am presupposing a causal theory of the will. The

operation of the will is governed by certain epistemic conditions which, given
438
therefore be a sign of this conative state, although it may be a

sign that nobody will be able to "read." And so, even in the case
of wildly eccentric usage-or, it may be added, slips of the tongue
involving the most massive and unrecognized error-we can
still speak about what the speaker's utterance signified, expressed,
and meant. For what came out was an effect, and so a sign, even
if an in-practice-unreadable sign, of a complex mental state of the
speaker.
It has been objected that what has just been said entails that,
if a speaker's utterance is an entirely convincing and successful lie,
then it will be a sign of the speaker's desire to deceive his audience.
For the utterance is an effect of this desire. Yet this is not what
the utterance "signifies" according to the theory developed in
this paper. And even apart from the argument of the paper, it
may be objected that it sounds odd to say the utterance is a
sign of the speaker's desire to deceive.
I do not think that there is a real difficulty here. The important
point is that a sign may signify many, even infinitely many,
things, yet signify them in virtue of the very same set of charac-
teristics of the sign (although differing amounts of further infor-
mation concerning the laws of nature and the environment of the
sign may be required for different "readings"). The complex men-
tal states of the sort that we have singled out for examination are
only one of the things signified by sentence-length linguistic
utterances. So I see no objection to saying that, in the case of the
successful liar, his utterance is a sign of his desire to deceive his
audience. By hypothesis, his audience cannot detect that the
utterance is a sign of this purpose. But we can easily conceive that
a suitably observant and instructed onlooker might read off
this purpose of the speaker from the utterance. Such an observer,
I suggest, will not find it odd to speak of the utterance as a sign
of this purpose (among other things).
Returning to the main point, I have been arguing that where
a man uses language in an attempt to communicate, but uses
the speaker's objective, may well limit what he can do in the attempt to realize
it. In particular, the speaker cannot do X with the object of bringing about r
if he believes that it is impossible that X should give rise to X. Clearly, this will
be relevant in attempts to communicate.
439
D. M. ARMSTRONG
it in a quite eccentric way, his utterance is still a sign of a complex

mental state of the sort indicated. And his meaning is logically
determined by, though it is not identical with, that mental state.
This contention entails a clear distinction between "the (or a)
meaning" of an utterance and "the meaning given an utterance by
a speaker on an occasion." Furthermore, it appears that the notion
of meaning that we have been trying to explicate in this paper
is the latter notion. In our scheme, the notion of "the meaning"
or ''a meaning" is to be analyzed in terms of this fundamental
notion: as the (a) meaning customarily attached to this utterance
by speakers within some social group. To put the matter in terms
of current controversy: I stand with Grice against Searle.
Before going on, then, we ought to look at the case that Searle
thinks constitutes a difficulty for Grice. It is the now notorious case
of the American soldier captured by the Italians in World War II,
who wants his captors to believe he is a German soldier but can
remember only one sentence of German-a line of poetry-which
he then utters hoping the Italians will take it to mean "I am a
German soldier." Put in my terms, his plan is that his audience
should infer that the speaker has the objective that his audience
should have reason to believe that the speaker believes that he,
the speaker, is a German soldier and, as a result, that the audience
should progress from this to believing he is a German soldier. Searle
points out that the words uttered do not mean "I am a German
soldier" but rather "Knowest thou the land where the lemon-
trees bloom?" And this fact is known to the speaker.7
Searle says that he is disinclined to say that what the American
means by his utterance is "I am a German soldier." But the only
evidence he produces to back up this intuition is the fact that
what the words mean (and what the American remembers they mean)
is something quite else. This evidence begs the question against
someone who distinguishes "the meaning" from "the meaning
given an utterance by a speaker on an occasion." And once this
distinction is made, it seems to me to have some plausibility to
say that the American does give the utterance on this occasion
an eccentric meaning. The sense of strain that the example
7J. R. Searle, Speech Acts (Cambridge, i969), pp. 44-45.
440
undoubtedly produces seems to spring from another source. It

would be natural for the American in this situation to think that
it was incredibly unlikely that the Italians would take his sentence
in the way he wanted it taken. And so the case is on the verge of
violating an epistemic condition on the operation of the will:
namely, that the agent must believe that what he is attempting
to do is possible of achievement. (See, again, footnote 6.)
It is fortifying to find doubts about Searle's case shared by
Grice.8 He produces a case where he knows that a small girl
thinks that a certain French sentence means "Help yourself to
a piece of cake" although in fact, as he well knows, it means no
such thing. He then uses the sentence as a way of getting her to
have some cake. Now, as Grice remarks, it seems plausible to
say that what he means by the utterance on that occasion is
"Help yourself to a piece of cake." But what is the difference
between this case and Searle's case? The only relevant difference
I can see is that Grice has good grounds for believing, as Searle's
American has not, that his attempt at communication will
succeed.
Before leaving the second objection, it may be in place to
call attention to a further distinction that can be drawn between
''utterance meaning" and "sentence meaning." The distinction is
necessary because of the presence of indexical words in language.
If A says, "I am six feet tall," and B says, "I am six feet tall,"
there is one sense in which what they say means two different
things but another in which what they say means the same thing.
We might say that the two utterances have different utterance
meanings but that the two sentences that constitute the utterance
have the same sentence meaning. It is clear that this paper has
been an analysis of utterance meaning. And it seems clear also,
although no doubt the detailed working-out involves complexity,
that sentence meaning can be analyzed in terms of utterance
meanings. Sentence meanings are a certain class of phonetically
or inscriptionally equivalent utterances whose utterance meanings
agree with and differ from each other in a certain systematic
8 H. P. Grice, "Utterer's Meaning and Intentions," Philosophical Review,

LXXVIII (I969), I60-I64.
44I
D. M. ARMSTRONG
manner. In the case of "eternal sentences" there is no distinction

to be made between utterance meanings and sentence meanings.
It may now be objected, third, that our account of the meanings
of utterances will include many things that are mere implications,
and implications dependent on the particular situation, of what
is said.
Supposing I say to you, "Jim will be coming," and suppose
that I know (that you believe {that I believe [that if Jim comes
Jack stays away]}). It may be that I had the objective that you
should have reason to believe {that I believe [that Jack won't
be coming]}. Yet what I say does not mean that Jack won't be
coming.
Here, however, I achieve my objective only as a result of first
giving you reason to believe {that I believe [that Jim will be
coming]}. It is only if this objective is achieved that my further
objective can be achieved. So we can say that the meaning of an
utterance is a function of thefirst proposition of the requisite form
that the speaker purposes that the audience should infer from his
utterance. Notice in any case that it can properly be said that
(at least part of) what I mean by my words "Jim will be coming"
is that Jack won't be coming. But we could also (instead) speak
of what I imply by what I say.
But, fourth, there are cases that fit our formula that are not
cases of linguistic communication at all. Consider a case mentioned
by Grice.9 I put down 39 cents, the price of my favorite brand,
on my tobacconist's counter. Here my action has the object that the
tobacconist should have reason to believe {that I have the objective
[that the tobacconist should give me a packet of brand X in
exchange for the money]}. And I can be insincere-for instance,
if I intend to snatch up the money as soon as the goods are offered.
Yet my act is hardly an utterance.
Compare this case, however, with the case where a policeman
flags down a motorist. The policeman's gesture is an act that
has the purpose of communicating and it may be said to mean
that the motorist should stop (and to express, sincerely or insin-
cerely, a purpose on the part of the policeman that the motorist
9 H. P. Grice, op. cit., p. 153.
442
should stop). It could be called an utterance in an extended sense.

What is the distinction between the two cases of the tobacconist
and the policeman?
I think the difference is that in the first case my action is not
a mere sign. It is not just part of the process by which I communi-
cate with the tobacconist: it is also the act of offering him money
for goods. It has a double role in the process which is intended to
climax in my getting the cigarettes. So we do not think of the
act as an utterance. We restrict the term "utterances" to mere
signs.
A fifth and final objection. "Jack won't be coming" means,
ordinarily, that Jack won't be coming. But, given non-eccentric
usage, it will mean that whether or not it is a sign that its utterer
had the objective that an audience should have reason to believe
that the utterer believes that Jack won't be coming. It did not
function as such a sign on the various occasions I have used it in
the course of this paper. Nor is it such a sign if it is uttered in the
course of a play, or as part of a piece of fiction. Yet its meaning
need not change.
The difficulty here is not that the correlation between certain
utterances and certain complex mental states of the utterer is
weakened. We have contextual and other devices that, more or
less successfully, let the hearer know that these utterances are not
signs that the utterer is in a certain complex mental state. None of
you who read this are deceived by my examples. The difficulty
rather is that such examples have exactly the same meaning as the
utterances that are signs, and yet they are not signs of the requisite
sort.
What I think we should say about these utterances that are
not signs is that they are mock signs, and that they derive their
meaning from the signs that they mock. Consider, for instance,
words spoken in a play. The actor representing a man called
Macbeth and another representing a man called Macduff speak
alternately in the hearing of an audience. Neither actor is issuing
signs of what is on his mind, nor does the audience take them to be
doing so. But they are mock-communicating. They are going
through the motions of communicating; they bring into existence
the outward and audible aspects of a communication situation.
443
D. M. ARMSTRONG
And the audience is in a mock overhearing situation, as if they

were listening to two communicators. Now the actors' words
certainly have meaning. But why should we not say that the
meaning derives from the significance that their utterances would
have in the situation that they are merely representing? And then
the same sort of thing can be said of telling a fairy story, producing
an utterance as an example, or talking to oneself. In the fairy
story case, the teller of the tale is imitating one who recounts
what he takes, or wants it to be taken that he takes, to be a sober
history. The producer of an exemplary utterance may be doing
little more than imitating the actual production of some sign.
The man who speaks to himself, either aloud or "in his head,"
goes through the motions of, or images going through the motions
of, communicating with himself. He acts as if he is two persons.
In all these cases, although language does not lose its meaning
and certainly has its uses, it does in an important sense "go on
holiday."10
I have argued that the meaning of utterances is a function of
their significance (or their mock significance) and that what they
signify is a complex mental state of the utterer. But even if what
I have said is correct, no more than the first blow has been
struck in explicating problems of meaning. The really difficult
problems, I would suppose, arise when we ask how it is that the
semantic units of semantically complex utterances contribute to
the meaning of the utterance as a whole. These are the difficult
semantic problems, and I am inclined to think that the empirical
science of semantics, now apparently beginning to emerge after
centuries of beating about the bush, will be of greater importance
in solving them than the speculations of philosophers. No doubt,
however, some of the insights the philosophers have achieved,
notably such distinctions as that between sense and reference, will
contribute to empirical semantics.
I think the value of what I have been saying, supposing it to
be on the right lines, lies elsewhere. One thing that is needed is to
dispel some of the mystery and darkness that has surrounded
the notion of linguistic meaning. The science of semantics can
10 Gilbert Harman seems to hint at the same view in a recent article,

"Sellars' Semantics," Philosophical Review, LXXIX (1970), 404-409. See pt. I.
444
then go forward without the nagging worries and intellectual

distraction that inevitably accompany unclarity about its funda-
mental concept.
APPENDIX
There are many sorts of speech act, and only two relatively
simple sorts, asserting and requesting, have been specifically
discussed in this paper. Can the general analysis proposed be
applied to more complex and sophisticated speech acts? I will
try to answer this doubt by giving an account of promising.
Suppose that A promises some audience that he, A, will turn
up tomorrow. The speaker has the objective that an audience
should have reason to believe-what? Something rather complex.
First, the speaker is expressing (sincerely or insincerely) the
firm intention to turn up tomorrow.
I speak of intentions and not simply purposes or objectives,
because "intention" is stronger than "purpose." Intention entails
the corresponding purpose, but it also entails that the speaker
believes that the thing purposed is within his power to do (deo
volente). Now for a sincere promise the speaker must believe that
the thing promised is within his power. So we require the word
"intention. "
But even the word "intention" is insufficient by itself. It is lin-
guistically in order to say "I intend to do X, but I may change my
mind." Intentions do not rule out a later change of heart, and that
change can be for no reason at all. The possibility of such future
change of mind is, however, excluded by a firm intention. Now a
sincere promise does not permit the speaker to believe that at
some later time he may arbitrarily change his mind. So A's
promise must express (sincerely or insincerely) the firm intention
to turn up tomorrow.
But second, a promise is far more than a declaration of firm
intent. In a sincere promise, where there actually is a firm intent,
the speaker has at least one reason for thus firmly intending.
He believes that, as a conventional11 result of making his utterance,
11 Further analysis of "conventional" is clearly required here for a full
account.
445
D. M. ARMSTRONG
he is morally obliged to turn up tomorrow. For A cannot promise

sincerely to do Xwithout binding himself morally to do X. (A may,
of course, believe he has other obligations that make the discharge
of this obligation an immoral act. Or he may believe that the act
itself, apart from his promise to do it, is immoral.)
Notice two points here. (a) This belief of A's that he is morally
obliged to turn up tomorrow does not make the firm intention a
redundant condition. A man can say, and believe, that he is
morally obliged to do X. but without self-contradiction add
that he has no intention of doing X. (b) The firm intention could
exist before the uttering of the promise. The belief in a moral
obligation is simply a sufficient reason for the speaker's holding
the firm intention. I would analyze the situation in terms of a
causal relation of sustaining between the belief state and the firm
intention, but such an analysis is not at issue here.
One may wonder whether one should speak of a (sincere)
promise as involving the utterer's belief that, as a result of the
utterance, the utterer is morally obliged to do the thing promised.
Would it not be sufficient to say simply that he has laid himself
under that obligation? But I think that this simplification creates
unacceptable difficulties. Suppose, for instance, that I promise a
statue something, believing it to be a human being. Necessarily,
if my promise is sincere, I believe I am in some degree obligated
to do that thing. But I am in fact in no way obligated.
But, third, the conditions so far laid down suffice only to make
the speech act an undertaking to an audience that the speaker will
turn up tomorrow. Promises are a mere species of undertaking.
For, as has been frequently observed, a sincere promise involves
the speaker in believing that his audience would prefer the fulfill-
ment of the promise to its non-fulfillment. So we must stipulate
that in sincere promising the speaker's believing he is morally
obliged to do the thing promised depends on his belief that the
audience would prefer fulfillment to non-fulfillment. Without
the latter belief the former would not be held. The belief about the
audience's preference is for the speaker a necessary presupposition
of his belief that he is morally obliged.
So A's saying to an audience, "I promise I will turn up tomor-
row," signifies that
446
(the speaker has the objective that an audience should have

reason to believe
{[i] the speaker firmly intends [that the speaker will turn
up tomorrow];
[ii] the speaker believes [that as a conventional result of
this utterance he is morally obliged to turn up tomorrow];
[iii] [what is believed in (ii) is a sufficient reason for the
speaker for the speaker's firm intention];
[iv] the speaker believes [that his audience would prefer
his turning up tomorrow to his not doing so];
[v] [what is believed in (iv) is for the speaker a necessary
presupposition of what is believed in (ii) ]}).
What A expresses (sincerely or insincerely) by his utterance is

what the sentences within the braces mean.
Finally, what A means by promising he will turn up tomorrow
is that:
He will turn up tomorrow for the reason that, as a convention-

al result of his utterance, he is morally obliged to turn up
tomorrow, a moral obligation which presupposes that his
audience would prefer him to turn up tomorrow rather than
not.
This formula, which brings together what is meant by the

sentences in brackets in the original formula, seems reasonably
intuitive.
D. M. ARMSTRONG
University of Sydney
447

Duke University Press, Philosophical Review The Philosophical Review

Uploaded by

Document Information

Original Description:

Original Title

Copyright

Available Formats

Share this document

Share or Embed Document

Sharing Options

Did you find this document useful?

Is this content inappropriate?

Copyright:

Available Formats

Duke University Press, Philosophical Review The Philosophical Review

Uploaded by

Copyright:

Available Formats

Philosophical Review

Meaning and Communication

O NE of the great uses of language is to communicate. Some

in linguistic behavior only. But both these propositions are com-

turned back many thinkers looking for an account of linguistic

1 I am here in argeement with the theoretical linguist Dr. Pieter Seuren.

Unfortunately, however, there are counterinstances to this

this point although his language remains atrociously ambiguous.)

source of unreliability. The speaker may be insincere. He may be

(the speaker has the objectives that an audience should have

Similarly, the utterance "Pass the salt" is a sign that:

(the speaker has the objective that an audience should have

Given a causal theory of the will, which I assume in this paper

from the sight of A to the belief that it is a B. If, however, I

(The speaker has the objective that an audience should have

8 It is not necessary that there should actually be an audience, or even that

(2) The utterance may be said to express whatever it is that

shown. 4 But is it not a mere contingent fact that linguistic meanings

4 Convention (Cambridge, Mass., i969).

where a man uses language in an orthodox way. But suppose he

6 Notice, again, that I am presupposing a causal theory of the will. The

therefore be a sign of this conative state, although it may be a

it in a quite eccentric way, his utterance is still a sign of a complex

7J. R. Searle, Speech Acts (Cambridge, i969), pp. 44-45.

undoubtedly produces seems to spring from another source. It

8 H. P. Grice, "Utterer's Meaning and Intentions," Philosophical Review,

manner. In the case of "eternal sentences" there is no distinction

9 H. P. Grice, op. cit., p. 153.

should stop). It could be called an utterance in an extended sense.

And the audience is in a mock overhearing situation, as if they

10 Gilbert Harman seems to hint at the same view in a recent article,

then go forward without the nagging worries and intellectual

he is morally obliged to turn up tomorrow. For A cannot promise

(the speaker has the objective that an audience should have

What A expresses (sincerely or insincerely) by his utterance is

He will turn up tomorrow for the reason that, as a convention-

This formula, which brings together what is meant by the

You might also like