ARBITRARY and IRRELEVANCE

Language as a Code
Prepared for Professor Stainton's course MC 32 280.
Written by: Shawn Monaghan (critical on Scribd.com).
NOV 94

The first section of this paper is a definitive one. In order to investigate the

claim that language is a code for communication, I must first define the terms,

"communication," "code," and "language." In the second section of this paper I will

deal with the code theory as defined by Sperber and Wilson. Section three will

deal with Condillac's code theory as outlined by Talbot J. Taylor in Mutual

Misunderstanding.

In Relevance, Dan Sperber and Deirdre Wilson outline the code model, in which

communication "is a process involving two information-processing devices" (Sperber

and Wilson 1). They explain that one of the devices modifies the environment of

the other. The result of this process is that the second device recreates in itself

what the first device transmitted. In terms of human communication, this means

the speaker, in the process of speaking, modifies the cognitive environment of the

audience (please note I am using speaker in the sense of both verbal and written

communication). The speaker thus creates in the audience the very same or similar

thoughts as within his/her own mind.

In attempting to explain how communication works, the code theory reflects an

understanding of what communication is. The speaker in the process of

communicating modifies the cognitive environment of his/her audience (Sperber

and Wilson 1).

The overt modification of the audience's environment is an important and implicit

aspect of communication. However, the code theory, as represented by Sperber

and Wilson, does not really deal with questions of intention and the overt

modification of environments. An alternative definition of communication is

described by Sperber and Wilson in the section on inference. Communication, they

write, is "a process of inferential recognition of the communicator's intentions"

(Sperber and Wilson 9). This definition is much more comprehensive than the one

I represented as the code theory on communication. It is much better than the

first definition as it more accurately portrays normal communication more closely.

For example, if someone were to say "I can't bear/bare it," the listener could not

know, on hearing that verbal statement, whether the speaker meant "I can't stand

it" or "I can't reveal (or disclose) it," unless that listener were to infer the

statement's meaning from the context of the conversation. How can the code

theory account for a case where the same phonetic symbol could have two

different meanings -- "bear" and "bare." The only reasonable method would be
through use of context and various inferential devices. The problem here is that

code theory ignores the necessity of cognitive devices like inference, thus falling

short as a theory to explain adequate transference of meaning from speaker to

audience. To explore these differences of definition I find it instructive to look

at morse code and compare it to English. This comparison should take place after I

have defined 'code'. So bear with me for another paragraph or so.

The above description of communication is a very basic one couched in the terms of

code theory, but there are other types and forms of communication. Body

language is a form of communication which could be explained as natural gestures

or postures that are communicated involuntarily by people who are not necessarily

communicating overtly. Body language could also be used as a form of overt

communication. For example instead of saying 'I do not understand' in

conversation a person could raise their eyebrow in a puzzled way. Thus body

language can communicate in a similar way as verbal or written communication.

Perhaps it could be considered a shorthand form of verbal communication. The

Code model can easily be modified to deal with the overt type of body language,

but it does not seem ideally suited for explaining the involuntary aspect of body

language. Body language is outside of the scope of code theory, perhaps because it

is relatively unmodified by human hands. Body language is considered more natural

than 'natural' languages (ie. English). Perhaps this is the reason it seems to be

neglected in language studies. In any theory that attempts to be a comprehensive

explanation or exploration into communication body language should be considered.

Because it is so subtle body language is often ignored by linguists and common

communicators alike, but it does impact on communication. Consider if a person was

in an interview for a job, consider also that this person keeps his/her eyes averted

most of the time and very rarely smiles throughout the interview. Even though the

interviewee might say s/he is very happy and well adapted to society his/her body

is saying s/he is sad and unsure of him/herself. The interviewers would take note

of this body language subconsciously and would likely not give this person the job

even if s/he is fully qualified. This situation described above is a common

occurrence in everyday communication. A persons ability to communicate what

they want can be impaired by their body language, and in the world of

communication impairment of communication can be pretty important.

Now that communication has been defined I must turn to the term 'code' and

define it also. A code is a representational system that is encrypted in some way.

That is to say a code is a representational system that has been designed in an

arbitrary way --at least to the degree that it is not obvious or necessarily

intelligible without access to the cryptographic device. According to Sperber and

Wilson a code is a device or infrastructure that pairs a symbol with an object or

concept (Sperber and Wilson 3). In their definition of code Sperber and Wilson do

not go far enough, their definition suits the entire family of representation and is

not specific enough to the sub-family of codes, a code by definition must entail

some element of arbitrariness.

In a representational system the symbol can be referred to as the signifier and

that which it represents as signified. The code process of communication goes

something like this: a person takes that which is to be communicated and encodes

it, this encoded message is then sent to the audience who then decodes and voila,

communication has occurred. Of course for the message to be intelligible both the

speaker and the audience must have the same sort of device for

encoding/decoding. By definition the message which is sent must be very similar or

exactly the same as the message received. According to code theory language is

the code which pairs sounds (or written symbols) with thoughts. While generative

grammar is the encoding/decoding agent. That which is encoded/decoded into

language is often not clearly referred (Sperber and Wilson 4) to, but in some other

accounts that which is encoded is 'thought' (Sperber and Wilson 5). What appears

to be lacking in this account is a precise or even vague definition of 'thought'. The

assumption about thought and code as a language which is unstated must be that
thought is something we do when we think, this thought must then be encoded into

language which can then be transmitted. What I think code theorists are doing is

jumping to the assumption that language is a code we use to communicate, and since

it is a code we must have to encode and decode it from some ill-defined meta-

physical construction we call thought. The problem is that this theory could just

as easily be replaced with the theory that language is thought and something else

is a code that our brains use to transform electro-chemical processes into

language. The proposed theory would go something like this. When I think I

believe I think in language directly. There is no reason for me to believe that I

first think in some sort of abstract 'thought', which is then transposed into

language. Code theorists provide no evidence that thoughts are separate from

language or even that thoughts can exist separate from a representational system.

If our mind must use a representational system for communication from one person

to another as code theorists claim, why is it that representation only occurs in the

communication sphere and not in the thought sphere. Perhaps code theorists do

believe representation occurs as a part of thought. If so how can they be justified

in concentrating solely on the communication process between individuals when it

seems clear that we must first 'communicate' to ourselves. Thought presumably

can not take place entirely in the abstract for if it could how could we think or
know or talk about anything. Certainly our minds need some sort of

representational system in order to think, we must first be able to have coherent

thoughts before we can communicate them, this process of developing coherent

thoughts can be referred to as communicating to yourself. Perhaps code theorists

would prefer to deal with the somewhat more accessible communication process

between people rather than within people and this is the source of their

justification. But even so there is no justification for ignoring thought itself and

merely assuming language is a tool solely for communication between people without

considering communication with the self. Condillac does have an answer for me

however:

While all the component ideas of a thought are simultaneously present in the mind,

they are given sequence in discourse: it is therefore [artificial] languages which

provide us with the methods for analysing our thoughts. (Taylor quoting Condillac

56)

Condillac appears to consider language as a tool for analysing thought but his

theory does still emphasize communication between people over communication with

oneself.

Language as referred to by the code model seems to be restricted to 'natural'

human languages such as English and Bantu. Other 'artificial' languages like morse

code are considered simpler versions of 'natural' languages and are useful as

examples for explaining how 'natural' languages work in terms of code theory. For

example just as '...,---,...' represents 'S.O.S' or the thought 'help!', so does 'chair'

represent an object you sit on. The fundamental difference between Morse code

and English is that English is not normally considered to have been invented by

anybody, whereas Morse code was designed and invented by a fellow named Morse.

But other than who or what created the language or how long it took to create it

what is the difference between Morse code and English as described by code

theory. Code theory seems to make little distinction between Morse code and

'natural' languages such as English. Both have signifiers which are symbols which

represent the object(signified) being referred to. Both are languages. Both are

basically encoded and sent by the speaker, received and decoded by the hearer.

Morse code is an encoded alphabet it was invented by Morse as he wanted a way of

communicating over long distances via electricity. Letters and words themselves

could not be sent, but pulses could. Morse designated '...' to signify 'S' and '---'

to signify 'O'. English is exactly the same according to the code theory, the only

difference being that words and sounds represent an abstract concept or process

theorists call thought. 'Thought' however is not defined. What is assumed here is
that this abstract concept called thought is what we call thinking. Language (i.e.

English) is the code for thought just as language (i.e. Morse code) is the code for

the English alphabet. This would appear to be the only difference between English

and Morse code one represents thought while the other represents letters of the

alphabet. This is a tremendous barrier to code theory as an model for

communication. For surely English is far more complex than Morse code, not only in

sheer numbers of signifiers and objects referred to by the languages, but also the

concreteness of representation entailed. For example '...' represents 'S' that is

all there is to Morse code. Whereas in English concepts like Feminism and Canadian

are represented by a signifier that is only slightly more complex than '...'.

Concepts like Feminism and Canadian are amazingly amorphous. Feminism can mean

'man-hater' or it can mean 'woman-lover' or 'egalitarian' as well as a multiplicity of

other things. Canadian can refer to mere citizenship status or various levels of

immigrant status from the days of Columbus and before to a time period of 20

years.

Having just said that English, for example, was not invented by anybody. I must

now clarify this to say no single person invented English as clearly some code

theorists as a matter of course do become involved in speculative history about

'natural' languages. Condillac theorized that language was invented through

humankind's interaction with natural analogical processes. He further theorized

that if the signifiers of language were arrived at arbitrarily: "If this had been the

case, how could they have understood one another?" (Taylor quoting Condillac 61).

The question that immediately comes to mind given Condillac's opposition to

arbitrary pairing of signifier with signified is that if Condillac is right what would

be the need of a code at all. That is to say if this 'natural' process of selecting

pairs of symbols and the things they refer to, originated from nature why did a

code evolve at all. Surely if the analogical process was available to all of humankind

at this time they should have been able to communicate without the need to

develop a code. Furthermore if language was derived from analogical processes

that humankind accessed from the environment how does Condillac explain the

immense diversity of languages across the world. If language as a code was not

derived in at least some sense arbitrarily, whence comes the difficulty of

communication that was supposedly solved by the language. To clarify, if

humankind somehow managed through interaction with the environment to develop

a non-arbitrary thought process of pairing symbols with objects , Condillac's

natural analogical process, would not their thoughts be intelligible to one another

without the need of a code. Supposedly the existence of the code allows two
individuals to arrive at the same thought through the process of encoding

transmission and then decoding of an idea. Yet according to Condillac in order to

arrive at this code it has to be accessible to all humans through a similar thought

process. That is to say the choice of signifier for signified must be objective in

some sense. How is it that they can not already communicate intelligibly to one

another without the need of an encoding/decoding agent. If they already have a

representational process they can all logically know and understand derived from

nature how can they have a need for a code system.

Condillac would appear to be going in the correct direction as to how our minds

could have evolved from simple sensational representations to analogical processes

through the development of language. But this only shows how a representational

system evolved as a function of thought and can not be inferred as a process

required for communication unless our thoughts can be shown not to have any

connection. The very connection Condillac stated that was required for humans to

understand one another appears to be what he is trying to demonstrate through

the code theory (Taylor 61).

It is a mistake to think that in the first creation of languages men could choose

indifferently and arbitrarily which words were to be the signs of which ideas. If

this had been the case, how could they have understood one another? (Taylor
quoting Condillac 61)

Why do we understand one another? Understanding one another was the initial

code theory problem. And the code theory was an exploration of the fact that

humans can communicate. The code itself is supposed to be the agent that enables

us to communicate. Condillac seems to be saying we understood each other even

while we were inventing this code which enables us to understand each other. So

why then did we invent the code? That is if we all have access to the same

analogical processes that gave birth to our language why would we have the need

for an encoding/decoding agent. It is precisely because the choice of symbol that

represents a given object seems arbitrary that makes a code is necessary for

communication. If the choice of symbol were not in the least bit arbitrary as

Condillac claims then perhaps his theory would be more suitably entitled

Representational theory --that is, a language is a representational system for

thought development moving from sensational representations to complex

analytical thought (Taylor paraphrasing Condillac 52).

This paper has not provided a very damning argument against code theory in

general, in fact I think code theory has a great deal of potential. Especially

promising would be a combination of code theory with an inferential model to fill in

the gaps of speakers intention and symbols with synonyms. Condillac's particular

version of code theory however appears flawed. His views on the institutional

nature and perfectibility of language are somewhat abhorrent to me (Taylor 58).

In fact concepts like the perfectibility of almost anything, but most especially

culturally significant things like language scare me to no end. In a future

envisioned by Condillac we could have 'thought control' in the Orwellian sense.

Where words are designed to limit the thoughts of the citizens of the Big Brother

state, by being static and limited in scope.

BIBLIOGRAPHY
Taylor, Talbot,J. Mutual Misunderstanding. Durham: Duke university press, 1992.

Sperber, D and Wilson, D. Relevance. Oxford: Basil Blackwell Ltd., 1986.