The Philosophy Corner: Nothing and Noise in Cognitive Science
Issue date: 5/4/06 Section: Opinions
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"Reality is tremendously noisy," according to Prof. Georges Rey; the noise that Rey is referring to is both literal and metaphorical, representing the disruption in communication both auditory and otherwise. So, how is it that we communicate through the noise? How do we convey our thoughts and intentions through booming and buzzing? This seemingly benign question is actually more puzzling than it might first appear.
Last Thursday, April 27th, philosophy Prof. Georges Rey from the University of Maryland, spoke to a mixture of philosophy and psychology students in the Phi Beta Kappa Room. Rey had run the Philosophical Café on "meta-atheism" the previous evening, arguing that modern Westerners who thought they believed in God were self-deceiving. The evening of the 27th, however, the lecture was on cognitive science and philosophy of the mind.
In everyday life we commonly accept that some of the things we think and talk about don't actually exist. Santa Claus is a perfect example. Santa Claus doesn't actually exist yet can be the object of one's thoughts, the thing that's being thought about, the intentional content of a thought. Rey argues that some intentional content must "depend in some way or other on relations a computational system bears to things outside itself," that is, our thoughts about objects must at some level be related to something external to us. An intentional inexistent is an object of thought which cannot be said to actually exist outside of the mind. Santa Claus is an example of an intentional inexistent.
In his lecture last Thursday, Rey argued that Standard Linguistic Entities (S.L.E) like sentences and words, are also intentional inexistents. "What actual thing in space time has this structure?" Without hesitation Rey responded, "nothing." And he's right. The sentence, "Students hate annoying professors," means two different things but is the same space-time object. It doesn't seem like there is anything in actual space and time that resembles the structure of a sentence. Herein lies the problem. Unlike other intentional inexistents (like Santa) sentences are commonly taken to be the foundation of our ability to communicate. How do we understand each other without S.L.E's?
Rey's solution is fairly simple. He claims that language is a folie à deux, literally meaning "madness for two." He claims through speaking we produce various waveforms in the air which then affect the auditory systems of the intended listener. The auditory system then makes a "good guess" based on cues in the sound wave about what the sentence being uttered might actually be. These cues are the foundation for our understanding each other, the basis for successful communication. Sentences are then really nothing more than reality's noise, interrupting cues.
-Kalen Sargent
"The Philosophy Corner" is a regular feature, sponsored by the Student Philosophy Club. Visit the Philosophy Club's discussion forum at. Would you like to contribute? Get in touch with us, or come to our weekly meetings in the Humanities Lounge (2nd Floor Humanities Bldg) at 4:30 Tuesdays.
Last Thursday, April 27th, philosophy Prof. Georges Rey from the University of Maryland, spoke to a mixture of philosophy and psychology students in the Phi Beta Kappa Room. Rey had run the Philosophical Café on "meta-atheism" the previous evening, arguing that modern Westerners who thought they believed in God were self-deceiving. The evening of the 27th, however, the lecture was on cognitive science and philosophy of the mind.
In everyday life we commonly accept that some of the things we think and talk about don't actually exist. Santa Claus is a perfect example. Santa Claus doesn't actually exist yet can be the object of one's thoughts, the thing that's being thought about, the intentional content of a thought. Rey argues that some intentional content must "depend in some way or other on relations a computational system bears to things outside itself," that is, our thoughts about objects must at some level be related to something external to us. An intentional inexistent is an object of thought which cannot be said to actually exist outside of the mind. Santa Claus is an example of an intentional inexistent.
In his lecture last Thursday, Rey argued that Standard Linguistic Entities (S.L.E) like sentences and words, are also intentional inexistents. "What actual thing in space time has this structure?" Without hesitation Rey responded, "nothing." And he's right. The sentence, "Students hate annoying professors," means two different things but is the same space-time object. It doesn't seem like there is anything in actual space and time that resembles the structure of a sentence. Herein lies the problem. Unlike other intentional inexistents (like Santa) sentences are commonly taken to be the foundation of our ability to communicate. How do we understand each other without S.L.E's?
Rey's solution is fairly simple. He claims that language is a folie à deux, literally meaning "madness for two." He claims through speaking we produce various waveforms in the air which then affect the auditory systems of the intended listener. The auditory system then makes a "good guess" based on cues in the sound wave about what the sentence being uttered might actually be. These cues are the foundation for our understanding each other, the basis for successful communication. Sentences are then really nothing more than reality's noise, interrupting cues.
-Kalen Sargent
"The Philosophy Corner" is a regular feature, sponsored by the Student Philosophy Club. Visit the Philosophy Club's discussion forum at
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