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Lumifer comments on Linguistic mechanisms for less wrong cognition - Less Wrong Discussion

7 Post author: KevinGrant 29 November 2015 02:40AM

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Comment author: Lumifer 01 December 2015 06:10:43PM 1 point [-]

So, during the Japanese tea ceremony do they drink the tea out of teacups? I don't think so.

As to Wikipedia, it's funny how they provide two images, one with a handle and one without. The one with a handle is called a "teacup". The one without a handle is called a "tea bowl" :-P

I am not sure why should I grant any authority to Anna Wierzbicka's opinion.

By the way, Wiktionary defines a teacup as "A small cup, with a handle, used for drinking tea".

Comment author: ChristianKl 01 December 2015 07:44:04PM 0 points [-]

The main point is that English is quite diverse. Not every language user uses it the same way. The British used to put a lot of value into drinking tea. The Americans generally don't but these days physicalism is quite prominent so it's reasonable when the meaning changes. What used to be about the purpose of the item became a word about whehter or it has a handle.

Comment author: Lumifer 01 December 2015 07:53:34PM *  1 point [-]

...used to put a lot of value into drinking tea ... but these days physicalism is quite prominent

Are you providing examples for this paper? X-)

Comment author: ChristianKl 01 December 2015 08:17:39PM -1 points [-]

No, I reference a well-defined meaning. Physicalism does happen to be about not seeing the purpose of an object as part of its identity. It does happen to be a strong cultural force.