意义不在场是符号的条件吗?——兼论自然主义的意义观

Is the Absence of Meaning the Condition of Symbol?——On Naturalist View of Meaning

意义问题是分析哲学中的核心问题,长久以来哲学家们为此争论不休,对意义的来源、表达、传播、理解和本性做了深入的探讨,当中以自然主义的意义理论最具争议。其原因在于以蒯因为代表的自然主义者把人类的语言现象作为一种自然现象来研究,难以涵括人类语言中的复杂情况。符号学超过半个世纪的发展为在自然主义框架下探讨意义问题提供了一条新的思路,在自然主义的框架下,符号的存在与否与意义的在场与否并无必然联系,语言作为一种符号系统在意义的获取、表达和理解过程中发挥了根本的作用。

The question of meaning is the core problem in the analysis of philosophy.For a long time,philosophers have argued about it and explored the origin,expression,communication,understanding and nature of meaning,among which the theory of naturalism is the most controversial.The reason is that the naturalists represented by Quine are studying the human language as a natural phenomenon,and it is difficult to cover the complex situation in the human language.The development of semiotics for more than half a century provides a new way of thinking about the question of meaning in the framework of naturalism.Under the framework of naturalism,the presence or absence of symbols is not necessarily related to the presence or absence of meaning.The symbolic system plays a fundamental role in the process of obtaining,expressing and understanding meaning.