21 Jul Naming the Nameless
As I started with coding and programming in architecture, I reached a point where I acknowledged the difference between the current mainstream architecture direction in the Middle East – Egypt in specific – and the rest of the contemporary and advanced architecture community. To be able to contribute to the expansion of a specific scientific knowledge base, one will first have to stand on the same data background as others limit – boundary – observers. To close the gap, one will have to be open minded to absorb a large amount of data. This includes accepting what the subject name implies despite its contradiction with the data represented by it.
For the last 5 years I spent a great deal of time researching new – and unfamiliar with – scientific facts and rules, that I have been forced to pursue to achieve my targets during my personal R&D exploration. For example, I had to revisit math as my study as an architect involved only simple references to general mathematics concepts. That was – sometimes – through a ranging interaction with media like YouTube and other internet information websites.
As an architect, my job has always been to connect the dots. I am required to be a master of grand scheme analysis. If an architect is tasked with designing a hospital, he/she will have to generate a knowledge base of the daily routine and equipment. Architects have to solve different problems, requiring thorough examination of system behaviors and its future expectations. I had to deal – in case of a real R&D activity – with direct knowledge sources that felt like it – generally – should be hard to understand/grasp by someone with a degree from another knowledge base. After a while, I developed – non-intentionally – a technique in which I ignored a complicated name of a book or scientific paper while I was hunting for a specific information inside. It was surprisingly better to make a quicker review to data contained, despite finding – most of the time – the need to review prerequisite concepts.
After a period of time, I recognized that this technique effect can be separated into two parts:
The first part is based on the idea that all human scientific knowledge can be identified as a description for a system that is not made by humans. Thus, this description acts as a medium between your consciousness and the real world, this has led me to always question if this description was most appropriate to deal with the subject from the observer point of view. What I mean isn’t necessarily an invitation to debunk a proven theory – although some need investigations – but its presentation and naming. For example, is Newton’s laws order the right one?[1].
The second part is driven by the need to absorb knowledge fast, which neglects the naming choice of the idea – one is studying – if it will affect how easy it is to absorb the data. Thus, focusing on the facts, rules and purpose. This helped me a lot to ignore any subconscious suggestion over the complexity of ideas I am dealing with, and that has led me many times to deal with concepts of math, physics and programming/coding with a fresh eye view.
I felt like I understood the origin of fixed mindset vs open one. I – like many of you – have been forced into a standard education system that permutes narrow minded vision. You are programmed not to question facts but to accept it at first. Then, you are told to choose a path for yourself in completing the society. When I was forced to accept a topic without a real target that needed this data, I didn’t remember forming attachment to the main ideas after finishing an exam.
My ongoing experience and results have led me to find that the most important thing – for my path of a fast constant R&D – is to have the mindset to get used to any specific shaped data and not only question the data but its shape, and what gives things shapes? It is called names.
Unfortunately, my previously mentioned methodology has dragged me through the rabbit hole. A lot of time I have found myself questioning terms rather than concepts, exploring with a freshly rewired brain relations between facts and how humanity – at a certain time of discovery/invention – decided to describe. I have formed an opinion that humanity’s knowledge must be put in a nameless format that every unique brain could interact with and have the freedom to make its own preferred reference name for it. The problem is what is the most efficient way to do that?.
The Naming Theory [2] :
There exists different concept for the naming process – proper name – in the language base of proposed rules.
Millian theory :
John Stuart Mill distinguished between connotative and denotative meaning, and argued that proper names included no other semantic content to a proposition than identifying the referent of the name and were hence purely denotative. Some contemporary proponents of a Millian theory of proper names argue that the process through which something becomes a proper name is exactly the gradual loss of connotation for pure denotation – such as the process that turned the descriptive propositions “long island” into the proper name Long Island.
Sense-based theory of names :
Gotlob Frege argued that one had to distinguish between the sense (Sinn) and the reference of the name, and that different names for the same entity might identify the same referent without being formally synonymous. For example, although the morning star and the evening star are the same astronomical object, the proposition “the morning star is the evening star” is not a tautology, but provides actual information to someone who did not know this. Hence, to Frege, the two names for the object must have a different sense. Philosophers such as John McDowell have elaborated on Frege’s theory of proper names.
Descriptive Theory of Names :
The descriptive theory of proper names is the view that the meaning of a given use of a proper name is a set of properties that can be expressed as a description that picks out an object that satisfies the description.
Causal theory of namess :
Combines the referential view with the idea that a name’s referent is fixed by a baptismal act, whereupon the name becomes a rigid designator of the referent. Charles Sanders Peirce described proper names in the following terms: “A proper name, when one meets with it for the first time, is existentially connected with some percept or other equivalent individual knowledge of the individual it names. It is then, and then only, a genuine Index. The next time one meets with it, one regards it as an Icon of that Index. The habitual acquaintance with it having been acquired, it becomes a Symbol whose Interpretant represents it as an Icon of an Index of the Individual named.”
You should have noticed the mixed opinion about the concept of naming stuff. It is as the methods humanity followed – in order to name stuff – has been evolving through the ages. In our period of time, one can assume that different methodology – of proper name – have been used in many cases. The main fact is that the appropriate naming method was decided by those who named it.
References :
[2] – Wikipedia sourced
youtube video downloader
Posted at 01:39h, 06 SeptemberThank you for sharing this insightful article! I found the information really useful and thought-provoking. Your writing style is engaging, and it made the topic much easier to understand. Looking forward to reading more of your posts!