Language

Suppose I write a computer program that randomly strings words together, and the first output it produces happens to be "I am a janitor." Is the output an instance of language? Does it mean anything, and if so, what?

Comments

In Reason, Truth, and History, Hilary Putnam imagines a similar scenario, supposing that an ant's movements through the sand produce marks that have the form of English words: Putnam asks, as you do, whether those marks should be taken to be words. I'm inclined to answer--as Putnam does--that the marks are not words and, hence, do not signify anything and are not an instance of language. There are various routes that one might take to this conclusion. Here's one. One might argue that in order for marks (or phonemes) to have a meaning, the producer of the marks (or phonemes) must intend for those marks (phonemes) to be understood. Neither the ant nor the computer program (presumably) can have such intentions, hence the marks (phonemes) are not significant. While these marks (phonemes) may, of course, be interpreted as significant by some competent language user, but they do not count as significant because they have not been produced by a competent language user. In the absence of such intentions, marks (phonemes) that seem to be significant are merely accidentally so, because they have been so interpreted by a competent language user, but they themselves are not themselves instances of language. There are, of course, other--perhaps better--routes to this conclusion: perhaps my colleagues will offer them! (If they agree with the conclusion advanced here.)

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