A radical new theory of the language of science by eminent linguist
Roy Harris. In The Semantics of Science Roy Harris challenges a
number of long-accepted assumptions about science and scientific
discourse. According to Harris, science - like art, religion and
history - is one of the supercategories adopted by modern societies
for explaining and justifying certain types of human activity.
Harris argues that these supercategories are themselves verbal
constructs, and thus language-dependent. Each supercategory has its
own semantics. The function of the supercategory is to integrate
what would otherwise be unconnected forms of inquiry, and the
result of such integrations is to draw a certain map of our
intellectual world. Among the questions tackled are: Is mathematics
a language? Does the language of science go beyond the bounds of
common sense? And, if so, on what basis? In a wide-ranging
historical survey, Harris rejects the view that the Greeks and
medieval thinkers had any concept of scientific inquiry that
corresponds to our own. He pays close attention to the early work
of the Royal Society and to the twentieth-century semantic crisis
caused by attempting to integrate Einsteinian relativity and
quantum mechanics. This lucidly written book will be of interest to
all those engaged in linguistics, semiotics, philosophy of science
and cultural studies.
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