§4. Instrumental usage of language

So far we have spoken only of a cognitive usage of language, i.e., a usage of language for the purpose of expressing true statements. Cognitive usage of language belongs to semantics, since truth is a relation between signs and objects. In addition, language is mostly used simultaneously as an instrument for attaining certain other aims. When we speak of instrumental usage of language we refer, in particular, to the aim of influencing the listener, or reader, for certain purposes intended by the speaker, or writer. Instrumental usage, therefore, falls into pragmatics.

The first form of instrumental usage consists in the intention of informing the listener. We speak here of the communicative usage of language. It should be realized that communication always represents a form of influencing the listener, since it is the speaker's intention, not only to convey a meaning, but to make the listener believe the sentences uttered. Every report given by one person to another is of this kind. When we do not succeed in arousing belief in the listener, the aim of communication has not been attained. When I tell Mr. A that Mr. B has committed an embezzlement, I wish Mr. A to believe what I say. It may be that Mr. A refuses to believe my statement; then I have not succeeded in communicating my knowledge to Mr. A. What I have achieved is only the communicating to Mr. A that I believe that Mr. B has committed an embezzlement; this result, namely, is reached when I have succeeded at least in making Mr. A believe this second statement. The raising of such belief is included in the aim of the communication. Maybe Mr. A refuses to believe even in the bona fide intent of my utterance, assuming that, contrary to better knowledge, I wish but to bring Mr. B into bad repute. In that case I have raised in Mr. A the belief that I have the intention of defaming Mr. B; but since it was not the aim of my utterance to raise such belief the incident cannot be called a communication.

The intention of making the listener believe what we say is usually expressed through a specific intonation which distinguishes a sentence we claim as true from, for instance, a sentence uttered as a question. For written language the acoustical criterion is replaced by a special sign of assertion, namely, the period at the end of the sentence; the period expresses the claim by the writer that the sentence is true, and his intention of making the reader believe the sentence. It is an interesting fact that we cannot completely dispense with such a special symbolism of assertion; it can be omitted only for certain statements, not for all. Thus when we first make a statement 'a' without an indication of a truth claim and then add the statement ' 'a' is true', or 'I believe 'a' to be true', the latter addition will help us only if it is equipped with the specific indication of assertion. This shows that the indication of assertion, be it made by a sign or by accentuation, is of a pragmatic nature and cannot be completely translated into a statement; it can only be translated into a statement to which an indication of assertion is added. Moreover, the indication of assertion would be redundant if it did not perform its function of making the listener believe, either the statement uttered, or the statement that the speaker believes the statement uttered, or something else; i.e., the indication of assertion exhausts its function in the production of a certain belief in the listener.

As the second form of instrumental usage we consider the suggetive usage of language. By this term we understand the use of language with the intention of arousing in the listener certain emotions, or of determining him to assume certain volitional attitudes. It is well known that the generation of emotions by means of language is one of the main purposes of poetry. But conversational language, too, is seldom free from this usage since even in everyday language we frequently attempt to make the listener approve, disapprove, appreciate, dislike what is said; or to cheer him up and make him our friend; or to make him feel critical of himself. Language is one of the most efficient instruments for interfering with a person's emotional life. From the generation of emotions there is only one step to the initiation of volitional decisions. By means of language we attempt to create in a person certain decisions as to what is good and what is bad. Thus language is the instrument of religious prophets and ethical leaders, of educators, of politicians; and it is equally the instrument by which every man influences the opinions of his friends or opponents. The possibility of suggestive usage is derived from the fact that we all have been conditioned since early childhood to associate certain emotional attitudes with certain words. These emotional attitudes do not coincide with the meanings of the words. Two sentences having the same meaning may produce very different emotional effects. Translate a poem into everyday language, or into the clumsy precision of juristic language, and the emotional effects are gone. This fact shows that the suggestive effect of Ianguage is entirely in pragmatics.

The third form of instrumental usage is found in the use of Ianguage for the purpose of inducing the listener to perform certain actions. We speak here of the promotive usage of language. To this category belong commands like 'shut the door', or 'thou shalt not steal'. These examples use the imperative form to indicate promotive usage; but the indicative form can also be used. Thus, sitting in a car we may say to the driver: 'the speedometer points to 85 miles'; by the utterance of this indicative sentence we intend to induce the driver to slow down to a more reasonable speed, and thus we may reach our aim better than by means of an impolite imperative. A famous example of promotive usage of language in seemingly communicative form is given by Mark Antony's oration on Caesar's death. The line of demarcation between suggestive usage and promotive usage is not strictly drawn. The generation of certain feelings in the listener may lead, and may be intended to lead, to actions of a specific type. Political speeches, with their emotional appeal and their intention of inducing the listener to put a certain slip of paper into a ballot box, constitute examples of such combined usage.

It should be clearly seen that the instrumental usage of language falls into a category to which the predicates 'true' and 'false' do not apply. These predicates express a semantical relation, namely, a relation between signs and objects; but since instrumental usage is in pragmatics, i.e., includes the sign user, it cannot be judged as true or false. If we want to introduce, instead of pragmatical relations, statements that are true or false, we can do so by making statements including the sign user. Thus to the imperative 'shut the door' we can coordinate the indicative sentence 'Mr. A wishes the door to be shut'. This sentence is true or false. Or instead of reading a line of poetry we may state that we wish to arouse such and such emotions in the listener. In this way it is possible to coordinate to every instrumental usage a true statement referring to this usage. Frequently the statements so introduced will not have the instrumental function to which they refer.

When we wish to judge, not a coordinated statement, but the instrumental usage itself, we must follow another path; we then shall support, or oppose, the expressed instrumental function by a corresponding instrumental function. This office is performed by the words 'right' and 'wrong', which are themselves imperatives. Thus the command 'thou shalt not steal' will be judged by us as right; this means that we make the command our own, we are willing to enforce it. Similarly, we may share in a statement 'this picture is beautiful' with the remark, 'that is right'; we then express the desire to join the efforts of the speaker in inducing other persons to feel the same emotional attitude. But the alternative 'right-wrong' must be clearly distinguished from the alternative 'true-false'. The merging of these two alternatives, or the attempt to regard them as of the same logical nature, has been the root of mischievous confusions, in which the history of philosophy has abounded since the time of Plato. But this is a problem with which we cannot deal in this book; it has its place within an exposition of the theory of value judgments. In this book we shall restrict ourselves to the analysis of the cognitive usage of language.