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From: myers@tybalt.caltech.edu (Bob Myers)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech
Subject: Re: The nature of communication
Message-ID: <4037@cit-vax.Caltech.Edu>
Date: Mon, 21-Sep-87 03:18:46 EDT
Article-I.D.: cit-vax.4037
Posted: Mon Sep 21 03:18:46 1987
Date-Received: Tue, 22-Sep-87 01:03:23 EDT
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Organization: California Institute of Technology
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Keywords: communication symbols messages

In article <2392@mmintl.UUCP> franka@mmintl.UUCP (Frank Adams) writes:
>
>Are the constituent elements of music *symbols*?  I think not; and the fact
>that they are not symbols, and cannot be used to make statements, rather
>strongly corroborates the claim.

I get the feeling we're running into definitional problems with 'symbol'.
Are you sure you're not defining symbols so that your statement is
true by definition?

I think music is, in some sense, made up of symbols, which are musical
structures. If you ask me just what they symbolize, I'm going to have
a really hard time answering that, though. I think the problem arises
because music symbolizes feelings, states of mind, etc., things which
are not readily translatable into written language, and in ways that
written language just cannot. Which is why they are expressed in
music to begin with.

Another problem is that the music is not readily broken down into its
constituent elements -- the structure itself is the symbols, and once
you start breaking it down, you destroy it.

I do know this: when I listen to certain pieces of music, certain
thoughts, memories, and emotions are evoked in my mind. At least
within my mind, a particular piece of music symbolizes a particular
state of mind (and fairly consistently). And different 'parts' of the
music make up different 'parts' of that state of mind, insofar as
either can be divided up.

Anyone else want to try this? I don't think I've said this well.

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Bob Myers                                         myers@tybalt.caltech.edu
			 {rutgers,amdahl}!cit-vax!tybalt.caltech.edu!myers