Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of California, 1964. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 179-182).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, 2007. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 223-230). Also available in electronic version.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Washington, 2006. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 305-315).

No description available.

No abstract available. / Thesis (M.Soc.Sc.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2013.

Thesis. 1977. Ph.D.--Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Dept. of Linguistics and Philosophy. / MICROFICHE COPY AVAILABLE IN ARCHIVES AND HUMANITIES. / Vita. / Bibliography : leaves 231-236. / Ph.D.

哲學家多認為日常關于語意的陳述 (如:「單身漢」意即未婚男性)乃事實陳述，陳述語義事實。這些哲學家大都還認為語義事實有物理基礎。對此本文提出兩重反駁。首先，語義事實並無物理基礎，因此 (物理主義認為)根本不存在語義事實。其次，日常語義話語既不陳述語義事實，也不要求語義事實存在，而應理解為一種虛構。第一章論證第一點 (基于Kripke的論證，但据本文目的作了適當裁剪):任何具備表徵能力的物理系統皆等價於擁有某一獨特、確定功能的機器;若語義事實有物理基礎，則功能事實當有物理基礎，但功能事實並無物理基礎。第二章首先論證日常語義話語不要求語義事實存在 (因我們對其存在與否實無所謂)，其次論證虛構話語 (如「Crotone在意大利的足弓上」)乃理解日常語義話語的最佳模型。將語義話語理解為虛構，非但合理可信，且多有啟發。本文結論認為，自然主義本身雖毋庸置疑，尋求自然主義的意義/表徵理論卻是緣木求魚。 / Many philosophers believe that the folk talk of meaning (e.g. “ ‘Bachelor’ means unmarried man“) states facts about meaning, or semantic facts. Most of them further believe that these facts are grounded in the physical reality. I argue against both views: (1) there are no semantic facts, insofar as they must be physically grounded; (2) meaning-talk does not state semantic facts, is not committed to them, and should instead be understood as a kind of make-believe. Chapter 1 presents an argument for (1), rst expounded (I think) by Kripke and here modied for my purpose. The argument is that any physical system with any representational capacity at all can be regarded as having a unique, determinate function; thus if representation--hence meaning--is physically grounded, so must be the function; but no such function can be physically grounded. Chapter 2 argues, rst, that meaning-talk does not commit us to semantic facts because we are indifferent to their existence. Second, that make-believe utterances (e.g. “Crotone is on the arch of the Italian boot“) more than any other discourse provide a good model for meaning-talk. Construing meaning-talk as make-believe is plausible and illuminating. I conclude that, while naturalism (I believe) is true, the attempt to naturalise meaning and representation is misguided. / Detailed summary in vernacular field only. / Shen, Jian. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2012. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 83-85). / Abstracts also in Chinese. / Abstract --- p.i / Acknowledgements --- p.iii / Table of Contents --- p.iv / Introduction --- p.1 / The First Thesis --- p.1 / The Second Thesis --- p.6 / Chapter 1 --- To Repudiate an Ontology --- p.9 / Chapter 1.1 --- Argument for Semantic Anti-Realism --- p.9 / Chapter 1.1.1 --- Premise One --- p.12 / Chapter 1.1.2 --- Premise Two --- p.14 / Chapter 1.2 --- Naturalisers’ Program --- p.19 / Chapter 1.2.1 --- Against Dretske --- p.24 / Chapter 1.2.2 --- Against Millikan --- p.28 / Chapter 1.2.3 --- Against Fodor --- p.35 / Chapter 1.3 --- An Exegetical Appendix --- p.39 / Chapter 2 --- While Enjoying Its Benefit --- p.43 / Chapter 2.1 --- Argument for Non-Commitment --- p.43 / Chapter 2.2 --- Another Argument for Non-Commitment --- p.44 / Chapter 2.2.1 --- Objections and Replies --- p.46 / Chapter 2.3 --- The Fictionalist Hypothesis --- p.60 / Chapter 2.3.1 --- Searching for a Model --- p.60 / Chapter 2.3.2 --- Why the Model Is Good --- p.65 / Chapter 2.3.3 --- Other Models --- p.71 / Chapter 2.3.4 --- Objections and Replies --- p.73 / Conclusion --- p.82 / Bibliography --- p.83

No description available.

In this dissertation an attempt was made to uncover the source of verbal associations. The investigation focused on establishing the locus of representation for associative relationships in the cognitive system and whether this locus is different from that for semantic relationships. A picture naming task and an object decision task were used within the standard priming paradigm, in which the target is preceded by a prime. A dual-level model was proposed in which associative relatedness is represented at a lemma level that connects the lexical form representation of a word to its semantic information. According to this model an interaction between associative and categorical relatedness should occur in picture naming, but not in object decision, when primes and targets share both relationships, and this is what was observed. To investigate the mechanisms of associative priming, asymmetrically associated prime-target pairs were used to create two situations. In the forward priming condition the target was an associate of the prime (e.g., brick-house), and in the backward priming condition the prime was an associate of the target (e.g., babyrattle). Unexpectedly, facilitation was observed for backward priming at the short SOA in picture naming. Because no effect was observed for this condition in the object decision task, and given that forward priming produced facilitation in both tasks spreading activation was upheld as the mechanism for associative priming. In order to investigate whether the source of the relationship between associates might be in their latent semantic content, the impact of instrument relationships (e.g., grinder-coffee), script relationships (e.g., zoo-tiger), and proximity in multidimensional semantic space were also investigated in the picture naming task. Items that were close in semantic space, but did not share any semantic relationships, produced the same priming pattern as category co-ordinates in picture naming (i.e., interference), while instrumental and script relationships did not produce a priming pattern that matched either that observed for associative or categorical relatedness. These results were taken to indicate that the source of associative relationships is in the co-occurrence of words in the language, which further supported the main claim of a dual-level model where information about verbal associations is stored outside semantic memory.

Thesis--M. Phil., University of Hong Kong, 1978. / Typescript.