The meaning of meaning

Or in other words, “What does the word meaning mean?”

I’m going to start off with a definition from the Oxford dictionary and go from there.

Meaning Dictionary Definition

mean·ing

/ˈmēniNG/

noun

noun: meaning; plural noun: meanings

1) [what is meant by a word, text, concept, or action.]

“the meaning of the word “supermarket””

implied or explicit significance.
“he gave me a look full of meaning”

important or worthwhile quality; purpose.
“this can lead to new meaning in the life of older people”

adjective

adjective: meaning

1) [intended to communicate something that is not directly expressed.]

“she gave Gabriel a meaning look”

ORIGIN

Text: late Middle English: verbal noun from mean^1.

mean¹

/mēn/

verb

gerund or present participle: meaning

1) [intend to convey, indicate, or refer to (a particular thing or notion); signify.]

“I don’t know what you mean”

(of a word) have (something) as its signification in the same language or its equivalent in another language.
“its name means “painted rock” in Cherokee”

genuinely intend to convey or express (something).
“when she said that before, she meant it”

be of some specified importance to (someone), especially as a source of benefit or object of affection.
“animals have always meant more to him than people”

2) [intend (something) to occur or be the case.]

“they mean no harm”

be supposed or intended to do something.
“we were meant to go over yesterday”

design or destine for a particular purpose.
“the jacket was meant for a much larger person”

have as a motive or excuse in explanation.
“what do you mean by leaving me out here in the cold?”

3) [have as a consequence or result.]

“the proposals are likely to mean another hundred closures”

necessarily or usually entail or involve.
“coal stoves mean a lot of smoke”

ORIGIN

Text: Old English mænan, of West Germanic origin; related to Dutch meenen and German meinen, from an Indo-European root shared by mind.

Distilled Meaning of the Words “Meaning” and “Mean”

Common Traits – The common traits that define the words ‘meaning’ and ‘mean’ are ‘intend’ and ‘convey’. When we use the word ‘mean’ we are essentially saying ‘intend to convey’. The idea is that there is an intention, and since that intention must be connected to something that is being intended, in this case, that something that is being intended would be to ‘convey’.

Trait Word Origins – Before moving forward, let’s look at the word ‘convey’ for a moment. The Oxford dictionary has this to say about the origin’s of the word ‘convey’:

Middle English (in the sense ‘escort’; compare with convoy): from Old French conveier, from medieval Latin conviare, from con- ‘together’ + Latin via ‘way’.

While we are at it, the origin’s of the word ‘intend’ are:

Middle English entend (in the sense ‘direct the attention to’), from Old French entendre, from Latin intendere ‘intend, extend, direct’, from in- ‘towards’ + tendere ‘stretch, tend’.

Conveyance Forms – Conveyance can be done in a material or conceptual form. When we talk about the word ‘mean’ we are basically saying that we intend to convey something. When we talk about the word ‘meaning’ we are basically saying that there IS or WAS and ‘intended conveyance’.

The reason for the word being that way is because of the suffix (a type of affix) that modifies the root word, in this case, the word, ‘mean’.

-ing

1) a suffix of nouns formed from verbs, expressing the action of the verb or its result, product, material, etc. (the art of building; a new building; cotton wadding). It is also used to form nouns from words other than verbs (offing; shirting). Verbal nouns ending in -ing are often used attributively (the printing trade) and in forming compounds (drinking song). In some compounds (sewing machine), the first element might reasonably be regarded as the participial adjective, -ing2, the compound thus meaning “a machine that sews,” but it is commonly taken as a verbal noun, the compound being explained as “a machine for sewing.”

2) A suffix forming the present participle of verbs (walking; thinking), such participles being often used as participial adjectives: warring factions.

Conveyance Types – There are various things that can be intended to be conveyed by the idea of ‘meaning’ or ‘mean’. Meaning can convey information, value, or use. The most common thing to convey is information. Some examples would be:

“What do you mean?” or said another way, “What do you intend to convey?”
“What is the meaning of that?”, or said another way, “What is the intended conveyance of that?”
“What is the meaning of meaning?”, or said another way, “What is the intended conveyance of intended conveyance?”

Meaning and Definition – Meaning has a wider but similar use that the concept of definition has. A definition is to set the boundaries to a thing by laying out the traits of the thing being defined. So when someone says something like, “What does that word mean?”, they are asking for the definition of that word. They are asking what that word is intended to convey.

Usage of meaning and mean – If a person is asking about “the meaning of life”, they likely also think of the idea phrased as “the purpose of life”. The phrases “What is the meaning of life?” and “What is the purpose of life?” are often said in close proximity. The word ‘purpose’ can be simply understood as ‘intended use’. A person could also be trying to understand what the intended value life is. You can distill the word ‘value’ to be simply understood as ‘ability to impart effect’.

When a person is asking something similar to, “What you mean by what you have just said?”, they are searching for the information you had intended to convey with your statement or statements. Generally this is because you have stated things too vaguely for them and the person is not able to effectively interpret the information that was in the statement or statements combined with the information and logical frameworks they currently have to work with.

A person will combine the information that was said with all the information they are aware of that would be considered to be their background knowledge. They will also be using their personal logical framework, their understanding of your logical framework, what your background knowledge might be, and any contextual information being presented.

Ambiguity in Language – There are various types of ambiguities that tend to exist in language. Two prevalent examples are ‘lexical ambiguity’ and ‘structural ambiguity’. Lexical ambiguity happens when a word in a sentence has multiple potential valid definitions for use in the statement that do not get sorted out effectively enough by context or various descriptors present. Structural ambiguity happens when a sentences informational contents being conveyed may change if there is multiple ways of interpreting the syntax.

Lexical Ambiguity example: “I am going to the bank.” – ‘bank’ could be a river bank or a place your checking account is through
Structural Ambiguity example: “I am looking at the man with the binoculars.” – looking using the binoculars OR the man has binoculars

Lexical Ambiguity can happen for various reasons. Some of the common reasons are Polysemy and Homonymy, stipulative definitions, and personal definitions.

Polysemy is where there is a coexistence of various possible meanings for a word or phrase. They have different but related meanings. An example would be “to drink milk” which is different than “to milk a goat”.
Homonymy refers to the existence of unrelated words that look or sound the same and have completely different definitions, and have different origins.
Stipulative definitions are definitions that are specific to a certain organization, field of study, or other type of environment where it comes from and is primarly used. Some example words that have such specific definitions would be a Marxist conception of ‘value’, or certain people that use a “privilege plus power” type definition for the word ‘race’. A more exceptionally unique situation is a made up word such as ‘grue’ that is defined as “a property of an object that makes it appear green if observed before some future time t, and blue if observed afterward”.
Personal definitions are definitions that are specific to a person. Many people have very specific ways of defining the words they think with and use in conversations and arguments.

Methods of Finding Meaning of Statements Made – There are two ways to respond to their request for the meaning of your statement, most of the time. There is a third way, but it isn’t generally what is being requested of. Let’s start with the first two common things you can do. You can elaborate or you can rephrase your statement or statements.

When you elaborate, you are giving a more detailed version of your previous statement or statements. Those details helps a person understand what information you are trying to convey to them.

When you rephrase something, you are putting the statement or statement into different words which then allows the person to compare your previous version of your statement or statements with your new version of that statement or those statements. This allows a person to do linguistical triangulation. That is where you are essentially taking the information of both sets and generating a new information set out of where those two versions of information sets overlap or closely connect.

The third thing that could be potentially being requested would be the point of the statement or statements. The point of a statement or statements is essentially the conclusionary set of information that comes what is being communicated. It is the point because it is the tiny point at the end of a consecutive set of statements, or more crudely said, stuff. This sometimes is requested because it can help a person take that information and the information from the statement or statements and infer the missing information that they were not previously been able to perceive. If it doesn’t help them understand enough of the information, it can help them generate more effective follow up questions to help resolve what information they are not yet perceiving.

Links

ConceptHut

The Meaning of Meaning

Meaning Dictionary Definition

Distilled Meaning of the Words “Meaning” and “Mean”