The Plasticity of Words

Why, I wonder, do we speak and write as if words have a single meaning? While it would doubtlessly be tiresome to clarify each of our words.  What reader or listener would have the tolerance to endure such slow-moving discourse?  But we surely need to clarify and seek clarification for key words in our reasoning. Linguists, cognitive psychologists, and our own introspection should have convinced us by now that a word is but a chord struck on the imagination.

And how do we identify key words? What are they key to? To answer that question we should consider why we use words in the first place. There are multiple accurate answers to the question.  We may be simply enjoying the thrill of utterance or desiring to create a vivid description of something that has captured our attention. But critical thinkers are always alert to the possibility that words are used to present an argument, i.e., to move us toward a belief or projected decision.

When words are a component of an argument, the multiple meanings of certain words are crucial to an accurate understanding of what we are being asked to believe.  For example, were I to urge you to read a certain book and provide as a reason that the book will enhance your happiness, you could certainly amuse yourself by asking me what I meant by “read” or “enhance.”  And if you did so, I would need to grant that you may be asking a relevant question. But regardless of what I mean by those words, the key to the argument is a shared understanding of “happiness.” 

Play with alternative meanings of happiness (And a comparison of the meaning in Bhutan and the U.S. is a good place to start.), and your eagerness to turn even the first page in the recommmended book will vary dramatically.  The very force of my argument depends on your desire to pursue the kind of happiness that I see attached to the experience of reading the book.  Even were we to have common definitions of happiness, there would still be multiple reasons why you might not read the book. (Perhaps, the last 4 I suggested were all duds.) But unless you are just curious about conflicting forms of happiness, you are much more likely to read the recommended book after I have defined happiness in a way that meshs comfortably with your own definition.

It is so tempting to think those with whom we communicate share our definitions. A more realistic assumption would be that they do not.

*Thanks to Jesse Griggs for the cartoon.