File spoon-archives/phillitcrit.archive/phillitcrit_1997/phillitcrit.9711, message 652


Date: Wed, 12 Nov 1997 09:51:12 -0400
From: Stirling Newberry <allegro-AT-thecia.net>
Subject: Re: PLC: Farbenlehre


At 6:00 AM -0500 11/12/97, Patsloane-AT-aol.com wrote:
>>  >   Wittgenstein favors the view that perception -- not just in-
>>  >terpretation -- is conventionally determined, therefore easily
>>  >suscep- tible to modification.  He argues that if, say, light
>>  >blue and dark blue were known by dissimilar names -- in the
>>  >example, the names are "Oxford" and "Cambridge" -- people would
>>  >say they saw no similarity between them (1958, 135).  The
>>  >generalization is too broad.  Names can create a bias for or
>>  >against the named object or color, which is why <daffodil
>>  >yellow> sounds more appealing than <pus yellow>.  But pairs of
>>  >color names as different in sound and spelling as <Oxford> and
>>  ><Cambridge> exist.  Viewers shown the pairs of colors, or
>>  >familiar with them, recognize a visual similarity.  Dark brown
>>  >and chestnut, cerulean and turquoise, ver- milion and crimson,
>>  >ocher and mustard, are examples.
>>
>>  But the creation of a separate word indicates a cultural or linguistic
>>  determination that a person in the culture *ought* to be able to recognise
>>  the difference between the two colors.
>
>Stirling,
>
>Not necessarily. There are thousands of color names in English, and
>dictionaries have been made of color names.  Nobody's done a linguistic
>analysis, but many of the names are probably synonyms. The range of colors
>you call dark brown I might prefer to call coffee brown, but we're talking
>about the same colors. Cerulean and turqoise probably mean the same thing.
> So how did we get two names for the same range of colors? They might be
>imports into Englsih from two different languages.  Or they might come from
>two different subcultures. One name might be used by artists and the other
>name by decorators.
>
>This happens in other areas besides color. A horse can be called a steed.
>Pigs can be called swine.  Spite can be called malice.  Sometimes it starts
>out that there's a small difference between what the two words mean.  But
>people get sloppy and use them interchangeably.
>
>pat sloane

Which is merely the same process in reverse. A distinction sinks down below
the threshold. Often the words remain in place. I would say that there is a
difference between a modification of a colour, such as "dark brown" which
is an attempt to create a distinction for a particular comparison, and the
creation of a separate word.

There is also another confusion that is in the W example - the difference
between distinctions which can be recognised by remembering signs, and
distinctions which require a higher level of perception. To a person who
follows fashion, the changes that take place merely required remembering
the alterations of elements that are already being observed. To a person
who does not, it requires a higher concentration on perceiving itself to
see the differences.


Stirling Newberry
business: openmarket.com
personal: allegro-AT-thecia.net
War and Romance: http://www.thecia.net/users/allegro/public_html




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