Representations represent as evolution designed them to do {bio-functionalism}.
Relation to behavior and/or evolution cause statements to have meaning {biosemantics}.
Brain grammars {Cognitive Grammar} and semantics {Cognitive Semantics} can relate mental representations to language. Cognitive Grammar has rules to link syntactic categories {readjustment rule}, to link syntax and meaning {projection rule}, to link linguistic to non-linguistic concepts {correspondence rule, semantics}, and to infer concepts from other concepts logically, pragmatically, and heuristically.
Word meanings are uses in situations {empirical semantics}.
Meaning depends on possible cognitive uses {functional role semantics} {conceptual role semantics} {inferential role semantics} {procedural semantics}.
To interpret texts, imagining others' experiences, in other locations and times, allows understanding of word and phrase meanings {hermeneutics}|. Physical data alone cannot explain human action, which needs mental-state analysis and interpretation. In studying and understanding, it is important to know writing style, intended audience, problem, and social and historical context. Writing can be formal or informal.
People are entities that make signs {semiotic materialism}: "You are what speaks you."
Sentence meaning is conditions that make sentence true {truth-conditional semantics} {model-theoretic semantics} {Situation Semantics}. Only whole sentences have meaning.
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Date Modified: 2022.0225