2. Summary and Conclusions

In this section of summary and conclusions, all attempts have been made to systematically highlight the prominences dealt with and studied as well as discussed throughout the research work.

1. Chapter One

Throughout this chapter, General Introduction to the Thesis, an attempt has been made to deal with and discuss the main points of language and philosophy of language, and especially of the historical background of the Buddhist Pāli Tipiṭaka. In the first section of this chapter, I have basically introduced the crucial definition of linguistics that linguistics is the scientific study of language, and presented some main points on language, specially the philosophy of language and its relation; that is, philosophy of mind. The next section has then taken an attempt to generally introduce the historical background of the Buddhist Pāli Tipiṭaka in which the Five Nikāyas emerge as one of the three collections of the Buddhist Canon, namely Sutta Piṭaka compiled from the outset of the First Buddhist Council, and were the first Buddhist texts recorded earliest in Pāli Buddhist literature. For this, an overview on the Buddhist Councils has briefly been taken as providing the historical evidence of establishing the Tipiṭaka. Further, this section has sought to fully present the Five Nikāyas, and to list the names of Suttas in detail respectively, and their outlines as well as their primary contents. In the third section I have particularly provided the necessary accounts to introduce the objective and significance of the study. And sources of research have been dealt with in detail in section four. The fifth and sixth sections have presented the scope and methodology of research respectively. The seventh section has made the chapterization for the thesis with totally six chapters; their chapter titles and summarized contents have been displayed. The last one has taken a sum of the entire chapter.

The development of linguistics as an academic discipline has been relatively recent and rapid, having become particularly widely known and taught in the twentieth-century. This reflects partly an increased popular and specialist interest in the study of language and communication in relation to human beliefs and behavior (for example, in theory, philosophy, information theory, literacy criticism), and realization of the need for a separate discipline to deal adequately with the range and complexity of linguistic phenomena; partly the impact of the subject’s own internal development at this time, arising largely out of the works of the well-known American linguist Noam Chomsky and his associates, whose more sophisticated analytic techniques and more powerful theoretical claims gave linguistics an unprecedented scope and applicability. Linguistics is the empirical study of natural language, and philosophy of language is concerned with the underlying nature of the phenomena that linguists study.

2. Chapter Two

The second chapter, The Concept of Philosophy of Language, deals with the principal theoretical background on philosophy of language drawn from linguistics’ perspective and philosophical literature. For this purpose, throughout this chapter, all attempts have been made to deal with, examine, discuss and analyze in great detail the major concepts and universal principles of philosophy of language, and especially of the close relationship between them. The principal notions have been fairly given and discussed in detail from the viewpoint of linguistics. In doing so, the chapter has gone through eleven major sections excluding the conclusion.

The first section has taken an attempt to generally discussed surveys a pool of general information about meanings and some major concerns relevant to the present work. The second section seeks to briefly bring out a general on philosophy in which two answers are frequently given to the question “What is philosophy?” that philosophy is an activity rather than a subject -in other words, you ‘do’ philosophy rather than learn about it in the one hand; that philosophy is largely a matter of conceptual analysis -it is thinking about thinking in the other. “Some philosophical questions” and “three mains areas of philosophy” are also dealt with and fairly discussed. The third section has focused on discussing on language and its concerns. At first, the essential definitions on language were defined by well-known linguists, philosophers, psychologists, logics, and so on, and emerging among of them is Chomsky’s view that ‘When we study human language, we are approaching what some might call “human essence,” the distinctive qualities of mind that are, so far as we know, unique to man.” Further, this section has attempted to delineate the subsection title language as a unique human behavior in which sixteen design futures proposed and listed by Hockett (1963), specially five major design features of human language have been discussed as a proof for the differences between human language and communication systems of other species. Among the theoretical formulas, there emerge two remarkable theories: one is la langue and la parole proposed by the Swiss linguist Ferdinand De Saussue, and another similar notion of competence and performance drawn by the famous American linguist Noam Chomsky who is considered as the father of the generative and transformational grammar and a major theoretician of the cognitive enterprise. These two theories ultimately resemble each other in part despite the fact that Saussure’s notion of la langue and la parole emphasizes on the social character of language systems, whereas the Chomsky’s notion of competence and performance focuses on the cognitive psychology. On the basis of such theories, five levels of language known as phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics are exposed clearly. The fourth section has mentioned the major premise for the theory of language faculty at which the work has been in turn exposed in four headings. The first one brings out briefly the picture of an interesting continuous dispute throughout the centuries between two positions contrasted as empiricism and rationalism. The former affirms that the source of all knowledge, including language, is based on experience, and denies the possibility of spontaneous ideas or a priori thought; there is no linguistic structures are innate, and that language is learned entirely through experience (Panda 1996). In contrast, the later, in philosophy, is seen a system of thought that emphasizes the role of reason in obtaining knowledge; that is, the doctrine here states that reason is the sole, or at least the primary source of knowledge. Rationalists assert that the mind is capable of recognizing reality by means of the reason, a faculty that exists independent of experience. The next is about Chomsky’s criticism of behaviourists’ theory of language directly with the American psychologist Skinner that “language serves as an instrument for free expression of thought, unbounded in scope, uncontrolled by stimulus conditions though appropriate to situations, available for use in whatever contingencies our thought processes can comprehend” (Chomsky 1975). The next headings which present the primary questions concerning language faculty, such as Innateness and LAD, human language faculty as an organ, Universal Grammar, and so on, have been in order presented. Such studies have largely established the major premise for the theory of Language Faculty proposed by Chomsky (1957) that determines that language is the result of innate cognitive structures in the mind, that all languages share common elements; and the universalities of the languages can be well explained on the term of phonology, morphology, syntax as well as semantics, that children possess an innate ability to extract meaning from speech sounds. The inborn brain mechanism which ‘programmes’ a child to be able to learn language was named by Chomsky as ‘Language Acquisition Device’, later commonly known as ‘Faculty of Language’ (FL). Having been viewed primarily as a genetic endowment and a component of human brain dedicated to language and its use, the innate FL determines the course of acquisition within the human brain. Language faculty, thus, must incorporate a set of universal grammar principles which enable the human to form and interpret sentences in any natural language made available as source of primary linguistic data (PLD) through motherese. Such a theory which seeks to describe FL is called by Chomsky as Universal Grammar. The Chomsky’s theory of the language faculty with universal grammar is, though criticized by a few of scholars, supported by most other scholars. Roughly speaking, scholars agree on the view that mind is the store that underlies our thoughts and sentiments; it is a system of mental organs, and language faculty too. Each of these organs has its own specific structure and function but interacting closely. Language is, as posited by Chomsky (1968), the ‘mirror of mind’ and as other side of a coin, it is also what mind achieves. Some arguments in support and criticism of such Chomsky’s theories have been also presented as a part of this section. In section five, the language comprehension which is defined by Prideaux (1985) language comprehension as a dynamic active process, not a passive act, in which the hearer is engaged as he/she constructs a systematic representation in his/her mind has been dealt with and discussed. Strikingly, this means processes of language are all deeply attached together in a chain from production to perception and then to comprehension. In such a chain, the hearer is always engaged in many processes with complexity of mind. The sixth section has dealt with and discussed the language production which shows that in the spoken process the match between what the speaker wishes to say and what he actually does is rarely a perfect one. It is because during speaking the speaker might produce some errors such as pauses, hesitation, repeats or replacements of the word, and so on, as he seeks to encode his ideas into speech. And this section has also drawn out the diagram to display the types of slips of the tongue. The study shows that language production is an intrinsically more difficult process than language comprehension. It is because production rules are not as easily accessed by experimental techniques as they are in comprehension. In comprehension, it is relatively easy to identify the ideas a person computes from a speech signal or a segment of speech whereas the process of production needs to consider where ideas for speech come from. In general, speech production is a complex process but an ordered activity. Unlike in comprehension, the generative enterprise of linguistic theory, however, has had only a limited influence on the theory and research in language production. The study of language comprehension and production forms a core dimension that constitutes ‘experimental psycholinguistics’. However, philolinguistics and psycholinguistics looks not only into the relationship between language and cognitive processes but also into the relationship of language to the biological considerations that must have governed language development in the species phylogenetically. Section seven has taken a general discussion on mind which considers all mental phenomena that are features of human beings such as sensation, perception, thought, belief, desire, intention, memory, emotion, imagination, and purposeful action. Shortly, mind is defined as thinks and experiences. The eighth sections has sought to discuss the truth and meaning which has been seen as the core notion in the study of meaning and representation, and the truth-conditional theses as “A sentence in use shows how things stand if it is true, and says that they stand for” or “Sentence s has as its use to say that p -or s means that p -just if whether s is true or not depends specifically upon whether or not p.” Section nine has presented and discussed the logical form, a key issue in neutralizing the philosophy of language, as remarkably noted by Russell that “Some kind of knowledge of logical forms, though with most people it is not explicit, it involved in all understanding of discourse. It is the business of philosophical logic to extract this knowledge from its concrete integuments, and to render it explicit and pure.” This section has further taken the propositions of P and Q as diagrams to illustrate. And the famous argument All H are Majjhima Nikāya, All Samyutta Nikāya are H, All Samyutta Nikāya are Majjhima Nikāya has also been discussed. The tenth section has specially discussed the semantics and truth with a truth-table drawn out. This section has also taken a definition on semantic value that “The semantic value of any expression is that the feature of it which determines whether sentences in which it occurs are true or false” for supporting the truth-table. Finally, the section eleven has dealt with and discussed the sense and reference which are the relation between names or signs of objects. We could view identity in sense as corresponding to the intuitive notion of synonymy: two expressions have the same sense if and only if they are synonymous as “The morning star is the evening star.” And when we are talking about reference, we actually need the context as pointed out by Frege “Never to ask for the reference of a word in isolation, but only in the context of a proposition.”

In sum, philosophy of language provides a comprehensive, meticulous survey of twentieth-century and contemporary philosophical theory and meaning. What called definitions or concepts of them are actually just given viewpoint of them from certain angles. The concept of mind has been established at various points of view from the western notions of mind and soul to the position of the contemporary philosophy of neurosciences of three views of mind: empirical, epistemical, and ontological. While empirically mind is regarded to be determined by neuronal states characterizing brain; epistemically, mind is determined by mental states accessible in the first-person perspective; and ontologically, mind is determined either by mental properties or physical properties. Buddhism offers definition of mind as the individual psychological characteristic of human intellectual abilities, the centre and focus of man’s emotional nature as well as that intellectual element which inheres in and accompanies its manifestations is thought. The Nikāyas present a fairly elaborate distinction between mind (citta) and consciousness (viññāna). While ‘consciousness’ represents the field of sense and sense-reaction that is the sphere of sensory and perceptive activity, ‘mind’ is defined as the cognitive ground underlying the dynamic system of psychological operations. Thus, language, as the word of Chomsky (1968), is the ‘mirror of mind’ and as other side of a coin, it is also what mind achieves. This idea will become more clearer-cut when brought in the light of context. And the philosophy of language is motivated in large part by a desire to say something systematic about our intuitive notion of meaning.

3. Chapter Three

The central study of philosophy of language is meaning. As the chapter title brought out, Language and Meaning as Reflected in the Five Nikāyas, this chapter has sought to present the critical background and review of the reference of language and meaning in the Five Nikāyas, and a brief critique of their conceptual and religious foundations. Thus, the chapter has dealt with ten major sections including the preliminary and the conclusion. The first one has discussed the generally philosophical and linguistic study on meaning. As shown, in philosophy of language, the study of linguistic meaning is center. The meaning of a word as Wittgenstein (1958) raised is determined by its use. Bloomfield (1933)’s view, “The meaning of linguistics form is the situation in which the speaker utters it and the response which it calls forth in the hearer.” According to Mortiz, “the meaning of a word or combination of words is determined by the set of rules which regulate their use.”^[1] Linguistically, meaning is the characteristic of a linguistic form which allows it to be used to pick out some aspect of the non-linguistic world. According to linguists, the central and intrinsic meaning of a linguistic form is its denotation or sense. The second section has presented and discussed the theories of meaning and their major concerned issues. According to most contemporary theorists of meaning that knowing the meaning of a sentence is not the same as knowing an object. In their opinions meaning consists in having a complex set of abilities which are manifested in the appropriate use of the sentence in question. Philosophical theories of meaning, as Locke’s view, are ideas in the head; the picture theory that sentences, as the early Wittgenstein’s view, are pictures of facts with which they share a form; the use theory that as the later Wittgenstein’s view to ask after the meaning of an expression often is to ask about its use; psychological or communicative-intention theories as Grice’s programme to reduce the meanings of sentences to the intentions of speakers uttering them via a notion of speaker meaning; truth-conditional semantics; inferentialist semantics which identifies meaning with inferential role; verification and assertibility theories that the meaning of a sentence, as the logical positivists’ view, is given by its method of verification, and Dummett’s account in terms of the conditions in which one is warranted in asserting the sentence in question. This section has also discussed the denotation that regarded as the set of things it could possibly refer to; and the connotation that is used “either as what determines what falls in the extension or as the function which assigns for each possible world an extension to a term in that world” (Tanesini 2007:29). The third section has focused on discussing the semantics in which paradigmatically a formal semantics for a fragment of a natural language consists first in assignments of semantic value to various subsentential portions of the language, such as objects to names and extensions to predicates, and truth functions to various operators. Prominently, Tarski’s famous convention T stated that an adequate definition of ‘true sentence’ for a language must have as consequences all sentences obtained from ‘x is true iff p’ by substituting for ‘x’ a structural description of a sentence of the object language and for ‘p’ the translation of this sentence in the metalanguage. Next, the semantic theory provides interpretations for complex sentences relative to a time, possible worlds and index. More specifically, formal semantics is the discipline that employs techniques from symbolic logic, mathematics, and mathematical logic to produce precisely characterized theories of meaning for natural languages or artificial languages. The section has furthermore discussed the TwoDimensional Approaches that the extension and even the intension of many of our expressions depend in some fashion on the external world. The Kaplan’s Character and Content, and other rules and semantic conditions are systematically presented and discussed in this section. The fourth section has dealt with and discussed the sense which as Frege held is as a criterion of identification of a reference. The fifth section has discussed and analyzed the Grice on speaker’s-meaning and sentence-meaning. The sixth section has specially presented and discussed the distinctive issues reflected in the Five Nikāyas as well as dealt with some essential Buddhist terms such as the Dhamma the Four Noble Truths, the Noble Eightfold Path, the Thirtysenven Aids of Enlightenment, The Four Noble Persons, The Four Jhānas and the Four Arūpajjhānas, the Nibbāna, and so on. In doing so, the section presents an organized and coherent discussion of the broader issues of the Five Nikāyas.

The emergent point was to point out the Six Perfections (traditionally found in the opening phrase of each Sutta), those are:

(i) “Thus,” implies perfect faith,

(ii) “have I heard,” perfect hearing,

(iii) “once,” perfect time,

(iv) “the Buddha,” the perfect Lord or Master,

(v) “on/at/in (the place),” the perfect place;

(vi) “with the great assembly of Bhikkhus,” the perfect assembly.

And at the end of each Sutta there is always a brief conclusion of the discourse in which it often shows its affect on the hearers. The section in turn has discussed on Dhamma. Apart from the general meaning of dhamma that refers to delivered ‘thing’, the Dhamma as in “He who sees Dhamma, Vakkali, sees me; he who sees me sees Dhamma. Truly seeing Dhamma, one sees me; seeing me one sees Dhamma” (Samyutta Nikāya, Sutta number 87) is understood as the Buddha’s teachings. The Nibbāna, which has in addition been discussed here, is the ultimate reality which cannot be described. It is “profound, hard to see and hard to understand, peaceful and sublime, unattainable by mere reasoning” and can only be implied by partly equivalent negative words such as ‘unborn’, ‘unageing’, ‘unailing’, ‘deathless’, ‘sorrowless’, ‘undefiled’ supreme security from bondage (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number 26.18-9). Particularly, the core of the Buddha’s teaching; that is, The Four Noble Truths has further been presented and discussed in detail. As discussion shown, the Suttas point out that the way leading to the cessation of suffering is nothing more than the Noble Eightfold Path (see §6.1.1), the middle way: “This, bhikkhus, is that middle way awakened to by the Tathāgata, which gives rise to vision, which gives rise to knowledge, which leads to peace, to direct knowledge, to enlightenment, to Nibbāna” (Samyutta Nikāya, Sutta number 56.11). The section has further gone to deal with and discuss the Thirty-Seven Aids of Enlightenment in which The Noble Eightfold Path that comprise the right view, and seen as the middle way is most prominent. The four planes of liberation which describes four noble persons who (i) Stream-entering, (ii) Once-return, (iii) Non-return, and (iv) Arahantship have also been discussed. Moreover, the section has discussed the Four Jhānas and the Four Arūpajjhānas. And finally, the Attainment of the Cessation of Perception and Feeling has been presented and discussed. For this, The venerable Dhammadinnā explains that when a bhikkhu is attaining the cessation of perception and feeling, his verbal formation (that is, applied thought and sustained thought) ceases first (in the second jhāna), then the bodily formation (that is, in-and out-breathing) ceases next (in the fourth jhāna), and the mental formation (that is, perception and feeling) cease last in the attainment of cessation itself. The seventh section has studied the contexts of language and meaning with the four important issues presented in the Nikāyas. As section eight brought out, the Buddha professes himself only to be a teacher who with compassion shows the way to his disciples and followers. He has never accepted the idea that man can get salvation by merely believing and learning in someone or the supreme. And he has never claimed himself as any divine status or a personal savior. Thus, the eighth section has dealt with and discussed the Faith and the Truth. Section nine has sought to mention and examined as well as discussed systematically the methodological characteristics of the Five Nikāyas. Generally speaking, the formats of discourses in the Five Nikāyas are greatly multiform and diversified. Many metaphors, similes and a lot of rhetoric were skillfully used by the Buddha to explain the puzzle questions persuasively. This section has particularly presented and discussed various scientific methods stated and applied by the Buddha as reflected in the Five Nikāyas, such as the Approach of Adaptation (§3.9.3), the Illustrative Approach (§3.9.4), the Analytical Approach (§3.9.5), the Experimental Approach (§3.9.6), the Silent Approach (§3.9.7), specially the stylistics, rhetoric, and so on.

The chapter, thus, with all its attempts has presented and discussed the language and meaning and their concerns, particularly the theorems which specify the meanings of each sentence in that language in a way that displays how these meanings depend on the meanings of its parts. More specifically, the Buddha’s teachings/language taught in the Five Nikāyas relate closely to the metaphors, the metonymies, particularly the similes, and the implicature, and so on, in order that his disciples according to their ability can understand those Dhammas, and practice them in conducing to the liberation, and enlightenment.

4. Chapter IV

The chapter four, Philosophy of Language in the Five Nikāyas, main study of this research work, has been a comprehensive study of philosophy of language in the Five Nikāyas in the theoretical background dealt with and discussed in the previous chapters. All attempts have been brought out to examine the convergence on the concepts of philosophy of language that are found in the contexts of the Nikāyas, and of what spoken of from the viewpoint of the contemporary philolinguistics. Thus, with its intense and critical appraisal the chapter has essentially presented in detail all the fourteen issues/sections bearing on the research topic of the philosophy of language in the Five Nikāyas. All these issues have been systematically and critically examined, analyzed and discussed, and a special attention has been given many other aspects that come to acquire the focal attention in the study.

The first section on its introduction tends to offer a brief account of pertinent information on philosophy of language and Buddhism as well as sectionization so that to enable an adequate critique in the chapter. The next section has brought out a multi-faceted aspect of language. Non-verbal communication is a notable point. The visible aspect of non-verbal, such as closing and the opening of the eyelids, winking, blinking, the way one looks, movement of the hands, and so on, is seen as ‘body language’. Communication through silence is a theme in the domains of philolinguistics and psycholinguistics, and applied linguistics. One should appropriately know the time to say nothing. Here, the possible reasons of the silence of the Buddha by the metaphysical questions are carried out in order to clarify partly the problem. “I am one who speaks after making an analysis; I do not speak one-sidedly” (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number 99.4), the Buddha said. Thus, his teaching is said to be twofold as presented in the Majjhima Nikāya in which two kinds of question are answered by the silence of the Buddha: questions of metaphysics and questions of the ultimate Real. Thus, silent language is a Buddhist method in communicating with each other as a following famous story that once on the Gridhakūta mountain, in front of his amount of disciples, the Buddha raised his hand with a lotus in silent, his greatest disciple venerable Kassapa immediately recognized the Buddha’s implicity. For that understood of venerable Kassapa, the Buddha appointed venerable Kassapa to be a leader of Sangha after the Buddha’s nibbāna. In the Nikāyas, there are six kinds of speech that the Buddha knows the time to utter or not (see §4.3.3). Section three has focused on language behaviour which is seen an outstanding reproduction of mind. From the viewpoint of function, mind can basically be divided into two categories; that is, primary mind and mental factors. While the primary mind is a cognizer that principally apprehends the mere entity of an object, mental factor is a cognizer that principally apprehends a particular attribute of an object. The primary mind itself is evidently a ‘pure consciousness’, fundamental, crucial and mental factor is secondary to or dependent upon it. According to the theory of Dependent Origination (paṭiccasamuppāda) (see §4.8), ‘formation’ (sankhāra) is the cause and condition for which consciousness arises. And in the successions of the conditioned law of the five aggregates (pañcakkhandha) there is a much closed conjunction between consciousness and mental factors that are contact (phassa), feeling (vedanā), and perception (saññā). This means that the quality of a primary mind or consciousness depends upon the mental factors that accompany with it and the relationship between them is the reciprocal relationship. In this section, all courses of speech and the models of verbal conduct are exposed in detail. In addition, the section also points out the Buddha’s instruction of the verbal conduct, which concerns to the terms of phonetics and dialect and sociolect. The forth section has set up the relationship between language and knowledge in which language as Chomsky (1968) affirmed “is a code that represents our hidden inner thoughts, a ‘mirror of mind’.” Dialectically, “language is not a separate source of knowledge” but “an indirect cognition of reality” Stcherbatsky (1999: 458). It is something what to be used to convey our knowledge or logically our indirect knowledge through inference. In addition, language in its intermediary function has aspects of epistemology (theory of knowing) and ontology (theory of being). As a sharp tool of knowledge, it operates in a characteristically dialectical process of veiling and revealing truths and even sometimes identified with the reality that it represents. It fulfills an interpretative function in the process of effectively apprehending as well as comprehending applied experience. The relationship of language to the real knowledge albeit is indirect and distant but close. Thus, “language mirrors human mental processes or shapes the flow and character of thought” (Chomsky 1968: 1). Rather, this section has drawn out the truth-table to illustrate the meaning of truth-functional sentential connectives. This offers an effective method for testing the validity of arguments in propositional logic. Further, two modes of knowledge; that is, ñāna and paññā are clearly distinguished from each other. In sum, language is not only an interpretative knowledge of the world and a conferral or comparison of meaning to life but also a means of access to the ultimately reality thus leading to the final liberated goal. Following the previous section, the fifth section has continuously focused on studying the characteristics of paññā ‘wisdom’ which has briefly introduced in the previous section. In the process of enlightenment and liberation, wisdom (paññā) plays a key role; it is a primary condition enabling one to penetrate the ultimate reality; that is, Nibbāna. When one possesses wisdom, one can truly see and know the real essence of things (dhamma) and thus capable of leading to the complete destruction of suffering. As discussion has pointed out that paññā ‘wisdom’ is as the light, “the light of the moon, the light of the sun, the light of fire, and the light of wisdom. Of these four lights, the light of wisdom is supreme” (Aṅguttara Nikāya, Sutta number 4:143); and as a knife “that cuts, severs, and carves away the inner defilements, fetters, and bonds” (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number146: 11, 12). The section also presented the way to grasp the noble wisdom through the Noble Eightfold Path in which the first two factors are the right view (sammādiṭṭhi) and right intention (sammāsankappa). In the sixth section, the important function of right view to the supramundane path as well as its requirements of language comprehension and language production is fairly showed up. As shown, wisdom is known as right view which is said to be twofold: conceptual right view, and experiential right view. The former is a clear intellectual grasp of the Dhamma; the latter is the wisdom that directly penetrates the Dhamma. Rather, the section has also mentioned two kinds of right view: (i) mundane right view which possessed by wise persons includes both kinds of Buddhists and outsiders; and (ii) supramundane right view which possessed by the disciples in both the higher training and the Arahants. In the Buddhist practice, right view plays a role as the pioneer or the forerunner (pubbaṅgamā) which provides the direction and efficiency for the entire path. Two conditions which are necessary for the right view are: the ‘voice of another’ (paratoghosa); that is, another’s utterance or teaching of beneficial Dhamma; and the ‘wise attention’ (yonisomanasikāra); that is, the analytical thinking on a contemplative subject of Dhamma. Both factors, in fact, in a way relate to the process of language comprehension although these two are derived from the different sides: the former comes from outside and the latter comes from inside. The acquisition of paratoghosa (the voice of another) requires the whole process of language comprehension from the first attention and thus motivates to concentrate on the listening to other or to the grasping of its meaning. Thus, in order to decode and to comprehend the other’s teaching for the purpose of arising the right view, one needs to necessarily engage in various mental processes and in the complexity of mind. In such a process the five stages corresponding with the five levels of language are fully applied. Further, right view is also assisted by the other five factors that are virtue, learning, discussion, serenity and insight. Among them, the two factors learning and discussion are embraced in both the processes of language processing in mind, viz language comprehension and language production respectively. Here, learning refers to learn the Buddha’s profound teaching which requires the learner to try to listen and read persistently. This process also requires a high level of language comprehension, because one has to first comprehend and grasp fully the meaning of the teaching, then alone he can apply rightly that teaching to the practice. Discussion, on the other hand, requires not only the capacity of right understanding but also capacity of analytic skill that is covered under the process of language production. Moreover, the language comprehension which is a complex and dynamic active process, and is a measure of one’s capacity in capturing the meaning from other’s utterance has also discussed in this section. The two tendencies–unwholesome and wholesome–which should be abandoned and should be cultivated respectively have been dealt with discussed in the seventh section. Following that, the unwholesome basically comprises ten issues divided into three groups: (i) bodily action: killing living beings, taking what is not given, and misconduct in sensual pleasures; (ii) verbal action: false speech, malicious speech, harsh speech and gossip; and (iii) mental action: covetousness, ill will, and wrong view. These unwholesome habits are said to originate from mind affected by lust, hate, and delusion. In contrast, the wholesome states also consist of ten courses of action which are completely opposite to the unwholesome, and the root of these ten is non-greed, nonhate, and non-delusion. Section eight has particularly studied the Dependent Origination (paṭiccasamuppāda) which is central to the Buddha’s teaching. This doctrine affirms that all phenomena or events in both mental and physical arise in dependence on causes and conditions and lack intrinsic being: “when this exists, that comes to be; with the arising of this, that arises. When this does not exist, that does not come to be; with the cessation of this, that ceases” (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number 38.19; 22). The ultimate purpose of the teaching on dependent origination is to reveal the conditions that sustain the round of rebirths and thereby to show what must be done to gain release from the round. This doctrine is so important that the Buddha said: “One who sees dependent origination sees the Dharnma, and one who sees the Dhamma sees dependent origination” And “one who can see those things, see the Tathāgata” (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number 28.28). The ninth section has dealt with and discussed on the five aggregations (pañcakkhandhā) that run: (i) material form (rūpa), the physical component of experience; (ii) feeling (vedanā), the ‘affactive tone’ of experience–either pleasant, painful or neutral; (iii) perception (saññā), the identification of things through their distinctive marks and features; (iv) volitional formations (saṅkhārā), a term for the multifarious mental factors involving volition, choice, and intention; and (v) consciousness (viññāṇa), cognition arisen through any of the six sense faculties; that is, eye, ear, nose, tongue, body, and mind. The Nikāyas use these to analyze human experience. The Samyutta Nikāya, Sutta number 22, explains critically the five aggregates for at least four reasons. First, the five aggregates are the ultimate referent of the first noble truth, the noble truth of suffering, and since all four truths revolve around suffering, understanding the aggregates is essential for understanding the Four Noble Truths as a whole. Second, the five aggregates are the objective domain of clinging and as such contribute to the causal origination of future suffering. Third, clinging to the five of wisdom needed to remove clinging is precisely clear insight into the true nature of the aggregates. Based on the Samyutta Nikāya, Sutta number 22.56, the section has drawn out the table on the five aggregates in order to demonstrate their content, condition and simile. The tenth section has mentioned and studied the characteristic of non-self. The most common formula builds upon their internal relationship as follows: (i) all sankhāras are impermanent (sabbe sankhārā aniccā); (ii) all sankhāras are unsatisfactory (sabbe sankhārā dukkhā); and (iii) all dhammas are without self (sabbe dhammā anattā). The first and second apply to all mundane things, everything that ‘exists’ (sankhāra). The third refers to the unconditioned element (a-sankhata). This does not ‘exist’. Thus, all things being subject to change and disappearance as the Buddha taught “Monks, form is non-self … Therefore, monks, any kind of form whatsoever, whether past, future, or present, internal or external, gross or subtle, inferior or superior, far or near, all form should be seen as it really is with correct wisdom thus: ‘This is not mine, this I am not, this is not my self’” (Samyutta Nikāya, Sutta number 22.59). The principle of non-self is to follow logically from the two marks of impermanence and suffering. The standard formula states that what is impermanent is pain or suffering, and what is impermanent, suffering, and subject to change cannot be regarded as mine, I, or self (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number 22.26). From the discussion in section, the evidence is borne out by the third characteristic: all dhammas in this sense including Nibbāna are without self. Section eleven has made an attempt to discuss the samatha ‘serenity’ and vipassanā. While, samatha aims at achievement of concentration and pursues through all jhānas, vipassanā aims at the direct personal apprehension and verification of the Dhamma. The target of vipassanā is the achievement of insight wisdom which enables one to cognize the true essence of all formations (saṅkhāra) as its three characteristics of impermanent, suffering, and non-self. It is this insight wisdom that leads to entry into the supramundane paths and to Nibbāna. This section has also studied the four foundations of mindfulness (satipaṭṭhāna). As the discussion pointed out Satipaṭṭhāna is established on four observations and contemplations of the body (kāya), feelings (vedanā), mind (citta) (mental processes), and mind-objects (dhammā) of oneself and of others. The practice of insight meditation is guided in a common subject within each of these four foundations of mindfulness. The section has further presented sixteen exercises of mindfulness of breathing as methods for practicing. In sum, four foundations of mindfulness are considered as “the bindings for the mind of the noble disciple to subdue one’s habits, memories and intentions, distress, fatigue, and fever based on the household life so that he may attain the true way and realize Nibbāna” (Majjhima Nikāya, Samyutta Nikāya 125.23). Having been one of the important topics of the chapter, the description of mind has been examined, analyzed and discussed in section twelve. This section has taken the beginning to discuss the meaning and the knowledge of language. Next, it has focused on discussing the defiled mind and pure mind as the discourse of “Simile of the Cloth” (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number 7) that demonstrated “when the mind is undefiled, a happy destination may be expected.” Further, the section has studied five wildernesses and five shackles in the heart. It pointed out that a bhikkhu must abandon all doubtful, uncertain, undecided, and unconfident about his (i) the Teacher, (ii) the Dhamma, (iii) the Saṅgha, (iv) the training; and (v) angry and displeased with his companions in the holy life. And he is requested to be free from lust, desire, affection, thirst, fever, and craving. The section has furthermore been mentioned twelve stains for a seclude that a bhikkhu is asked to abandon. The diversity of mind and the methods to incline mind in which the Buddha points out forty-four factors that the mind needs to be inclined have furthermore been discussed in the section. Finally, the five methods for removing unwholesome thoughts have also been mentioned and studied. Applying these principles and concepts as discussed above, the study goes on to describe the variety and diversity of mind in which the imperfect and perfect minds are distinguished from each other. The first task in the Buddhist investigation of the mind appears to so refine the attention and balance the nervous system to enable the mind to become properly functional, free from the detrimental influences of unwholesome states. The thirteenth section has focused on examining as well as discussing the cultivation and development of the four immeasurable minds. Parallel to the training of mind is the cultivation and development of language behaviour which can be seen as an outstanding reproduction of mind. In training of the four immeasurable minds, one extents these immeasurable minds not only to special objects he has known but also to all ten quarters of the world. He is guided to “abide pervading one quarter with a mind imbued with loving-kindness, likewise the second, likewise the third, likewise the forth; so above, below, around, and everywhere, and to all as to himself, he abides pervading the all-encompassing world with a mind imbued with loving-kindness, abundant, exalted, immeasurable, without hostility and without ill will” (Majjhima Nikāya, Samyutta Nikāya 7.13). Having done this, his mind becomes pure and he understands clearly about the Four Noble Truth.

In general, throughout the conclusion section, all distinctive features presented, examined, discussed as well as analyzed in whole chapter have been summarized crucially and systematically. The central task of the philosopher of language is to explain what meaning is. The Buddha underlined the importance of meaning that holds most cherished position after the Dhamma. Aspects of meaning are special and peculiar in the Pāli literature. Different ways of expressing or encoding ideas in language represent different patterns of thought, so that encountering different linguistic ‘options’ for encoding ideas can influence the way we reason. Language, whatever way used, should produce the necessary meaning that matures into the realization of Dhamma.

5. Chapter V

The main purpose of this chapter, the language and thought, is to present a concise statement on the relationship of language and thought from a vast panoramic perspective of linguistics and many other concerned fields such as philosophy, psychology, and Buddhist literature. Language is an essential part of human cognition. All scientific studies show that language is not an isolated system; it depends heavily on other cognitive processes. For the purpose of a critical appraisal of such nature and relationship of language and thought, the chapter has first sought to present an overview of the research area of language and thought, and cognitive science. Thought, as pointed out by Frege (1982b), is the objective content that we grasp when thinking,” and “thoughts are not psychological entities since they exist independently of our ability to think them” (Tanesini 2007). Further, thoughts are public so that different individuals can literally have the same thought, rather than having thoughts which are only exactly alike. Thus, for Frege, “a thought is a proposition, and a thought, so understood, is the sense of a declarative sentence and has as its constituents the senses, or modes of presentation, of the logical parts of that sentence.” Moreover, Davison (1975) argues that “there cannot be thought without language: in order to have thought (specifically beliefs), a creature must be a member of language community, and an interpreter of the speech of others.” This first section has also taken a brief discussion on cognition which can be considered as an act or process of knowing. Cognition includes attention, perception, memory, reasoning, judgment, imagining, thinking, and speech. And furthermore, the section has focused on examining language and its concerns. All studies bring out the answer that language is not an isolated system; it depends heavily on other cognitive processes. Whereas cognition is in its general sense, largely independent from the peculiarities of any language and can develop to a certain extent in the absence of the knowledge of language. The second section has dealt with and discussed the relationship between the body and the mind by tracing some argumentation over centuries of the philosophers, linguists, scientists such as Descartes, Locke, Newton, Aristotle, Galileo, Hooke, Chomsky, and so on. Following that, the body can’t be equated with the person. Yet without the body, the person could not have existed. Somehow, both the body and the mind, soul or self are aspects of a person. Most of us live quite happily in two different kinds of worlds: physical and medium. The striking differences between these two ‘worlds’ are that physical objects have dimensions of length, breadth and height, but emotions, thoughts and so on do not. Furthermore, emotions and thoughts dwell in a secret, subjective world to which no one from outside has direct access. Descartes (1985) claims “that body and soul were separate, and he was accepting a dualism.” He says that “the soul is joined to the whole body, not to anyone part of it, because the body is one and indivisible, and if we remove one of the body’s organs, that renders the whole body defective.” Descartes is talking about the soul, a religious concept, and not just the mind. The mind can’t exist without the body, since it dies when the body dies. This section has also discussed the relationship between thinking and matter. The question is if thinking could be associated with matter, then the soul, the thinking part of human beings, might be material rather than immaterial. And what would that mean for the immortality of the soul? And the action at a distance and the mechanics of movement were also discussed in this section. Following that, Newton enunciated the principle that “everything continues in ‘the state in which it is’ unless it is interrupted by some external force (cause). Hence, ‘[a] body once moved will always keepe y^e same celerity, quantity & determination of its motion” (Herival 1965: 153). And Herival (1965) holds that “A body is said to have more or less motion as it is moved with more or less force, that is as there is more or less force required to generate or destroy its whole motion.” despite the progress that genius had made, the problem of the nature of matter had not really been solved; nor has a final solution been arrived at in the twenty-first century. The third section has given a concise view of the communicative conception and cognitive conception in which according to the former, “the function and purpose of natural language is to facilitate communication and not … to facilitate thinking” (Carruthers 1996a: 1), in contrast, according to the latter, “we often think in language, and the trains of reasoning which lead up to many of our decisions and actions will consist in sequence of natural-language sequences” (1996a: 2). The discussion has showed that the exclusive function and purpose of language is the communication of thought, where thought itself is largely independent of the means of its transmission from mind to mind. The communicative conception is now dominant in many areas of the cognitive sciences. On the other is the cognitive conception of language, which sees language as crucially implicated in human thinking. Roughly speaking, on this view, the natural language sentences are the vehicles of our thoughts. Those espousing the cognitive conception have not claimed that language is used exclusively for thought, of course; they have allowed that it is also used in communication. Rather, the section has presented a brief overview of the traditional polarised views on the relationship between language and thought by three basic standpoints; that are, philosophy, psychology, and linguistics for both cognitive concept and communicative concept. As discussion pointed out, language is essentially an input or output device for central cognition. The natural language system is considered to be a mere conduit through which thoughts are transmitted into, and out from, central cognitive processes of believing, thinking and reasoning, without itself actually being implicated in the latter activities. What strikingly remarkable is the distinction between the claim that language is required for certain forms of thought, and the claim that language is involved in those forms of thinking. The fourth section has discussed the historical shift from behaviourism to cognitivism. For the behaviourists, all mental states, including all intelligent and cognitive capacities, were considered to be understood as input–output relations between stimuli from the environment and external bodily behaviour and dispositions to such behaviour. While behaviourists believed that they could explain and characterize thinking, reasoning, speaking, understanding, desiring, and so on, without an obvious reliance on the casual role of any internal mental states, the cognitivists rejected this and maintained that the sciences of the human mind cannot afford to avoid referring to internal psychological states and processes that seem to mediate between the stimuli form the environment and behaviour. The linguists such as Noam Chomsky and George Miller were known to lead the increasing bandwagon of contributors to this shift. Beside, taking such thoughts into consideration, Miller summarizes seven aspects of human language (see §5.4). According Frege, all kinds of expressions have a sense as well as a reference, and thus section five has focused on discussing on sense and reference. For Frege the sense of a sentence is a thought, and that such sense determines the reference of the sense, which is its truth-value. He sees the distinction between sense and reference as the key to solve the puzzle about identity statements such as “the morning star is identical to the evening star” and “the morning star is identical to the morning star.” As displayed in figure 1, a name expresses its sense, and dominates its reference, and in turn, sense determines reference (see figure 1, and 2 in §5.5). The crucial point is that informative statements of identity occur when and only when names which denote the same reference, but express different senses flank the identity sign. When two such names occur we have the same object presented again, but via different senses. And this fact is supposed to explain the possibility of informative, but true identity statements. The sixth section has examined the Linguistic Relativity Hypothesis drawn by Benjamin Lee Whorf. Whorf considered thinking as largely a matter of language and inescapably bound up with systems of linguistic expression. In other words, all higher levels of thinking are dependent upon language, and the structure of the language one habitually uses determines his or her world view. And different languages are assumed to lead to different world view. Linguistics Relativity Hypothesis shows that language shapes thought patterns. The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis postulates that language influences thought to the extent that speakers of certain languages will tend to think in certain manners, as governed by the rules of that language. Accordingly, language affects thought -the language a person speaks affects the way that person thinks, meaning that the structure of the language itself affects cognition. The Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis basically brings out three striking premises: first, structural differences between language systems will be paralleled by nonlinguistic cognitive differences for native speakers of languages. Second, one’s language structure will tend to influence or determine one’s worldview. Third, the semantic systems of different languages will tend to vary unpredictably and in unlimited ways. The seventh section has taken a discussion on the correspondence of linguistic structures and cognitive structures which should be determined to investigate the influence of cognition on various linguistic levels. There have been two main distinctions; that is, the lexical level and grammatical level. At lexical level, the speech signal tends to continuously and immediately project not only onto the lexical level but also onto levels of semantic and pragmatic interpretations. The projection from the signal to message, in fact, can be viewed as carried out just about as fast as is either neutrally plausible or informationally possible. At the grammatical level, the distinctions employed by a language may influence the ease with which a speaker can adopt a particular mode of thought. While the lexical elements together contribute the majority of the content of a sentence, grammatical elements determine the majority of the structure of the cognitive representation. The grammatical specifications in a sentence provide a conceptual framework, a skeletal structure or scaffolding, for the conceptual material that is lexically specified, whereas in mental lexicon of a language is characterized by the lexical creativity. The Whorf’s hypothesis is observed in terms of the two distinct versions: the strong one and the weak one. For strong version, language is considered itself to determine cognition; the presence of linguistic categories creates cognitive categories. The weak version, on the other hand, is considered to simply suggest that linguistic structure tends to have influence on the various cognitive operations. The evidence from analyses of corresponding linguistic structure with cognitive structure shows that there only the weak version can be validly supported and approved by most of scholars, and it is only this version that actually seems to be tenable. The view of modularity in cognition has been dealt with and discussed in the section eight. The proposal has showed that the human mind is itself modular, with different kinds of information processed by separate and distinct modules; their output then submitted to a central processing component for final processing decisions about what has been comprehended. Fodor (1988) points out that grammars divide the information which they present into separate modules, and the linguistic theories differ from such modules and the place where the boundaries between them should be drawn. He also suggests that the mind is like a computational system, with separate input modules for vision, hearing, and language, and a central processing system. In general, the language system is in sequence composed of a set of processing modules, which function autonomously, and theoretically do not have access to the internal operations of the other subsystems as they are in operation. Each interacts upon output, at which point its processing decisions are made available to the next module. The ninth section has sought to deal with and discuss language, thought and language of thought. Three possible constructions have been outlined; that is, (i) there may be effects of language on thought which derive from having a language versus not having one -the enabling function of language, (ii) there may be effects on thought which derive from speaking one language rather than another–the shaping function of language, and (iii) there may be effects within a given language community from using language in one way or another–the facilitating function of language. The orders of priority which are distinguish three kinds of priority question: ontological, epistemological, and analytical have also been discussed in this section. Following that, X enjoys priority over Y if Y depends on X but X does not depend on Y. So, any question of the relative priority of X and Y has four possible answers: (i) X has priority; (ii) Y has priority; (iii) X and Y are mutually dependent (inter-dependent); and (iv) X and Y are independent. To say that thought enjoys ontological priority over language is to say that language is ontologically dependent on thought, while thought is not so dependent on language. That is, there cannot be language without thought, but there can be thought without language. To say that thought enjoys epistemological priority over language is to say that the route to knowledge about language, specifically about linguistic meaning, goes via knowledge about thought, specifically about the contents of thought, while knowledge about thought can be had without going via knowledge about language. In order to have thoughts, a creature must be a member of a language community, and an interpreter of the speech of others. According to the third kind of priority, analytical priority, to say that X is analytically prior to Y is to say that key notions in the study of Y can be analysed or elucidated in terms of key notions in the study of X, while the analysis or elucidation of the X notions does not have to advert to the Y notions. If we fix on the notion of thought content, or intentionality, as a key notion in the study of thought, and the notion of linguistic meaning as a key notion in the study of language, then the four possible positions on the relative analytical priority of thought and language can be sketched (see §5.9.1.1-4). In section ten, an attempt has been taken to discuss the issues and the interactive relationship between/of language and thought such as the evolution of linguistic complexity, models of semantics, syntax, evolution without natural selection, spoken word recognition, and so on. The eleventh section has tried to crucially discuss metaphor and metonymy in which a metaphor is a rhetorical trope defined as a direct comparison between two or more seemingly unrelated subjects, and is thus an important tool to carry emotions and associations from one context associated with objects and entities in a different context; and is generally considered to be a direct equation of terms in a forceful and assertive manner. Metaphor is principally a way of conceiving of one thing in terms of another, and its primary function is understanding. Metonymy, on the other hand, has primarily a referential function; that is, it allows us to use one entity to stand for another. Like metaphors, metonymies are not random or arbitrary occurrences, to be treated as isolated instances. Metonymic concepts are also systematic. Metonymic concepts allow us to conceptualize one thing by means of its relation to something else. In Nikāyas, Buddha uses the metaphor, metonymy, and specially simile in most of Suttas, such as “The Simile of the Cloth” (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number 7), “The Simile of the Saw” (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number 21), “The Simile of the Snake” (Majjhima Nikāya, Sutta number 22), and so on. The twelfth section has taken an evasive attempt to discuss the position of Buddhism on language and thought. Buddhism draws a distinction between right cognition and wrong cognition. Right cognition is cognition followed by a resolve or judgment which is, in its turn, followed by a successful action. In a word, it is successful cognition. Whereas cognition leads astray, deceives the sentient beings in their expectations and desires, is error or wrong cognition. Error and doubt are the opposite of right knowledge. The Buddhist theory admits only objects as moments, as string of events, and makes a sharp distinction between the senses and the intellect as two different instruments of cognition. In the cognitive process, the first moment is always a moment of sensation, it has the capacity of kindling the action of the intellect which produces a synthesis of moments according to its own laws. The first moment of awareness -cognition -is what constitutes the source of right knowledge, the source of uncontradicted experience. It goes to suggest that language is not a separate source of knowledge, and names are not the adequate or direct expressions of reality. Names correspond to images or concepts; they express only universals while reality consists of particulars, not of universals. The universals cannot be reached in purposive actions. Thus, concepts and names are the indirect, they are the “echo” of reality, they are logical, and of course, not real.

As we all known, human beings, from a very early age, develop the internal processes that represent sensations and perceptions in such a way they can be stored in memory, and later brought into consciousness and manipulated without the present of the stimuli that originally evoke them. Being aware of and responding to these internal processes happens to be a natural part of acquisition and development and as they learn language, they are likely to call them by such terms as ‘thinking’, ‘imagination’, ‘imagery’, ‘ideas’, ‘concepts’, ‘beliefs’, and so on. Thus, thought is the conscious or unconscious manipulation of internal processes for oneself. And communication, whether through language or other means, is behaviour in which its initiator, one of the participants in communication act, seeks, whether successfully or not, to arouse certain internal processes in the recipient of the communication and possibly to secure certain overt responses on his part by encoding an information into a signal and transmitting the same to the recipients, the hearer or reader as the other participant. Language symbols, or rather, the internal processes that underlie given language symbols for the individual, may figure prominently in thinking and may often determine their direction.

Specific language codes are said to have an influence on the thinking processes. However, it is unlikely that speakers of different languages have, by virtue of the languages they speak, different world views, or different degrees of capacity to solve certain problems. There are more similarities than differences in the way language codes tend to symbolize concepts, because these concepts happen to be the result of the transactions of human societies with a physical and social environment that has much uniformity over the world. Differences, notwithstanding the basic human intelligence, are usually sufficient to overcome them. Moreover, by looking at different languages one can only gain insight into the general principles that seem to operate and govern the interactions between linguistic and non-linguistic information.

In general, studying of language and thought is not easy to cover all systems of natural language and its concerns as well as thought in particular.

This chapter has sought all the best attempts to deal with, to examine, to discuss, and to critically analyse in great detail the language and thought and language of thought as well as their concerns. One can conclude that language and thought are intertwined and plentifully established in relation to the process, thus further strengthening the interactive relationship between language and thought.

6. Chapter VI

In order to particularly recapitulate the study, an attempt has been made to systematically summarize the highlights presented, examined, analyzed, and discussed in great detail throughout the research work. The present chapter has gone through the previous five chapters and taken fairly a cogent task to conclude the emergent and notable questions of the thesis. For the purpose of this research work, the chapter has brought out and discussed on several topics presented in the Five Nikāyas on the perspective of linguistics, particularly on philolinguistics. Finally, this chapter also seeks to indicate the implications as the emergent need to extend the scope of studying further some issues in order to aim at contributing the valuable research in the domain of learning in general and the study of Buddhism in particular.

Footnotes and references:

[1]:

See footnote §1 of chapter Three.